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One of my Carolinas laid an unfertilized egg sack on one of the sticks in her cage today.  Can I just scrape it out cleanly now?  Do I need to do it quickly, in case it gets sticky and hard if I wait too long?  I'm hoping for a clean removal.  Thanks!

That's a good question...it wasn't even that long ago, but I can't really remember!  I've always really admired mantises, even though I've only seen a few of them in the wild in my life.  They seem so elegant and beautiful, as well as intelligent and otherworldly.  There's something special...

Hey, sorry if this is a dumb question, but my plant doesn't seem to realize that it's caught some flies, and it opens up its mouths the day after I put them in.  It closes perfectly well, but reopens the next day.  Is something wrong?  My last flytrap did the same thing, and I never found out...

Eyy you were right, they mostly hatched today.  I was panicking because my last batch didn't hatch at all, hm.  I guess that one was just a fluke.

I have a male adult ghost and a male adult Carolina mantis, and both have barely eaten in the past two weeks since their final molts.  They're both skinny.  The Carolina mantis nibbled some of a cockroach the other day, but gnawed its shoulder off before dropping it and leaving it alone.  Today...

Cool!  I'm thinking of breeding my ghosts, and if I manage to get some fertile ooths, I'll try to raise a rainbow generation of babies!

Ah okay, I'll keep waiting then!  I'll use cockroaches in the meantime.

I can't take this any more!  I've ordered two sets of bluebottle pupae, each from a different popular online mantis vendor.  The first one took 2 days longer to arrive than it was supposed to, and none of the pupae ever hatched.  I guessed it was because it took so long to arrive. But this...

Hi mantis people, My brother, who lives on the other side of America, found a mantis yesterday that was heavily injured.  He took it in and has been trying to care for it.  I told him it is not going to live and he should just mercy kill it, but he refuses to do so.  He thinks it can still see...

I have 3 adult carolinas that I grew from L2s and I agree with Aquaticcreature.

Update: When molting time neared, I put their cages up again so they could hang upside down, and they flopped again, but were able to molt nonetheless. After the molt, Jebediah wasn't flopping any more, but Eve was.  Both had one molt left, so I turned Eve on her side again until her next molt...

Hey, all but one of my mantises are adult now.  Humidity is important for mantises to molt properly and it can also allow them to drink water.  Now that they're done molting, do I still need to keep their homes humid other than to provide a water source for them?

When one of my ghosts was around L3, she liked to hang from the hygrometer I affixed to the wall one day.  Later that day, it fell while she was hanging from it.  It only fell 2 inches, but it is heavy enough to squish an L3 ghost.  Luckily it rotated while falling and she was okay.  That's when...

Turn it sideways until it comes to molting time.  When it's ready to molt, put it upright again.

Michaels have tons of flowers of every color.  I was just there yesterday choosing foliage.  Each branch cost between 2 and 15 dollars.  2 dollars for the most basic ones, 8-12 for the more interesting ones, and 15 for a branch with a fancy flower on it.  They had a 40% off sale when I went, so...

You guys were right!  One of my mantises molted and she still only has wingbuds!  Also I'm pretty sure they are actually Chinese mantises instead of Carolinas, because they're getting way bigger than 4.5 centimeters.

I've turned their cups over to deter that bad posture for the past week, but now they should be ready to molt any day now.  So I turned their cups right side up again, allowing them to flop back again but also giving them room to hang.  I fear that the bent body will make molting difficult or...

Today I fed the largest of my home-caught flies to one of my mantises, and as soon as she grabbed it, a bunch of larvae spewed out of the fly's rear.  Not sure if we can swear here but it was ******* gross.  They landed on the bottom of the cup and are writhing around there.  While she ate, more...

Hey, a few of my Carolina Mantises have recently molted to L6 or so, and now when they hang upside down, their butts flop down, bent like paper right behind their rear legs.  Basically, their body shape looks like this: ^ Aren't their bodies supposed to be erect?  I wouldn't be worrying if...

I see my carolina mantises have wingbuds after their most recent molt.  Does this mean they have just one more molt left?