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It can't be the genetic line. Those mantises were all caught in the wild as adults. (That might actually be the problem. Maybe there was some sort of parasite infesting our backyard this year.) And I was feeding them from the same stash of mealworms I was feeding the nymphs, none of whom died...

Seems like it's a new thing every year. Last year, I lost most of my nymphs to the same disease. This year, only one nymph died that way, but I kept finding my adults (all European) dead at random. No sign that anything had been wrong with them. I just woke up in the morning and they were dead...

@Grapple_AppleThanks. I think asking what instar was pretty imprecise on my part. Congratulations on "getting back into the game" as you put it :)

If a site selling mantises lists one of the options for a species as "subadult female," what instar is it most likely? If that sort of estimate is not possible, is it most likely still in the middle of its childhood or a couple of molts from adulthood? 

@The Wolven She's a European mantis :)

I've had a lot of fun over the last week posing Emerald on our Christmas Tree ornaments. She's way less energetic than her only remaining companion, Irene, so she won't be on the other side of the tree before I can get the camera to focus :)  

@The Wolven The freezer is way different from the fridge, though. I have been wondering for a while if it's possible to anesthetize mantises in the fridge. One of my mantises needed an amputation this year, and if that situation ever comes up again I'm testing that theory. 

@CannedSwank WOW. Thanks for the warning!

I can't see it either, but the one in the first picture looks crazy cool 

@Bugmankeith That is an interesting question…the mantises I have euthanized this way were pretty clearly dead when they came out. Of course, most of them were already dying of illness or injury first, and they might have just finished bleeding out in the freezer. But I get pretty sentimental...

Those are some pretty cool markings on her back :)

No, it doesn't have something she could have held onto…and she did come from the lawn around the church building. One of the many things to do different next time, I guess. Thanks!

It's BEAUTIFUL

Thanks for answering one of my longstanding questions about mantises :) Do you suppose they lose consciousness when they get that cold? 

Hi. I can't seem to get my mantises' final molts to go right…I have never actually seen a nymph mismolt, which is probably a miracle considering that just about everything else that could have gone wrong has for me at least once, but the last molt into adulthood goes wrong very often for me. (Or...

Welcome! How is that original Asian doing? How big is it?

Is is safe to feed praying mantises spiders? We have way too many spiders around our house and feeding them to Christina (my one permanently staying adult mantis at the moment) seemed like a good way to tamp down their numbers. (I'm not squeamish about/scared of spiders. There are just way too...

Thank you :)

What are the odds of a mantis turning up if they vanish inside of a house? I have had this happen 5 times in the last 5 years and 4 of them came back. (The most recent one to return actually reappeared within a foot of her cage. Why, I don't know. She's always trying to escape.) The fifth...

Sometime around May 28, the mantis egg my mom bought from Insect Lore hatched. I originally assumed they were Europeans but they seem kind of big compared to other nymphs I've seen, so maybe they were Chinese. I don't have pictures just now.  I have two questions. One, is it normal for nymphs...