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You know those black spots on the underside of M. Religiosa's fore arms, right? They make it easy to identify the species. These spots, as you may know, can either be full black or with a tiny white spot added. How about both?

It's that time of the year again, when my Religiosa ooths start hatching like crazy. Also it's when I make some of the stupidest mistakes. Two years ago, I was convinced the nymphs couldn't get through ventilation holes in terrarium lids but they did, in their dozens. Last year I duct taped...

A friend of mine just posted this pic on Facebook a while ago and I was intrigued. It was found in the capital city of Lisbon Portugal in a building's porch. I want to agree that it escaped from someone's home but this type of exotic pet keeping isn't very popular around here.

Instead of pinning it on the wall like any other dead mantis, making it look it got crucified or something like that, I've been experimenting in giving them more living poses and here's the result of my first try... with some hiccups and technical issues along the way. At the same time I've...

For the first time since I started this hobby, a male Religiosa managed to outlive all my females. He mated 2 of them, got attacked and bruised by one and saw them perish. Very impressive given the fact that the oldest males I had died in early November. It's also the first male I see actually...

Just an interesting video I found I thought on sharing

For those unfamiliar with it, it's an antlion. Probably the easiest pet to keep. Learned everything I needed to know about them in 10-20minutes. I didn't know they existed in Europe and I got very surprised when I found it. I stumbled across this one while removing weeds from my garden. Unlike...

One of the biggest spiders around here and easy to find. Not exactly sure about the species, though. Because the colors can vary quite a lot. But I'll bet on Zoropsis spinimana, a type of false wolf spider. It's the staggering color patterns that got my eye

This is a compilation I made from a great number of clips I took of my Mantis religiosas catching their prey. Most of them, which are of better quality, were filmed in 2013. Hope you enjoy :)

I've been pondering on this because of what happened here recently. 3 days ago I had 3 live M.Religiosa (females, obviously). One of them was pretty beaten up. She aged very quickly. Her wings got brown stains. Her antennae were rotting and the legs breaking apart very early. The two others by...

One of my Religiosas had the unfortunate luck of losing all the leg tips in less than a week. So I decided to help by making prosthetic claws for her. I made 3 for her back legs, and I plan to add another to the one leg left. I will leave the fore arms alone. They are simple pieces of aluminium...

It's not uncommon to find very dark brown colored male Mantis Religiosa. They are one of the prettiest, in my opinion. But during all these years I never found a female that could match the same dark brown color, until this year.

It's not news to me when it comes to removing an ooth from an unwanted or tricky place but this case it's a whole new level. Suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I went to a friends summer house for a week expecting my mantids to survive with a very large meal before leaving and a daily mist that my older brother would provide. All of them survived except my most valuable mantis, a Geomantis Larvoides that I caught in April. The first of its kind that I...

Just found a snake in my backyard that was severely wounded by 2 of my cats that were playing with it. I picked it up and put it in an aquarium with dirt. The snake was so exhausted it didn't even fight back when I grabbed it. I identified it as being a Ladder snake. A reasonably aggressive and...

So I was suddenly interested in making an ant farm. I was looking for a relatively big species of ant and tried to dig up a nest for the queen. But amongst the gargantuan foraging worker ants I found this little guy in the middle of dry soil and ant nests with no foliage whatsoever around...

This female has beaten all my expectations for longevity. Sure there are mantis species that can live 1 year or more and I wish I could afford those. But for a Religiosa I think it's incredible. Hopefully she will reach February. The old age abdomen infections have recently started to emerge so...

Ok, so this is topic I should have posted long ago but anyway. 2012 was the first year in which I successfully bred Mantis Religiosa since they were born. From 9 healthy specimens only 2 reached adulthood. The rest was killed by an ant raid, a topic that I posted here some time ago. The 2 male...

So today I lost a male Reliosa, or more precisely currently losing. It's death came really fast from perfectly fine this morning, to collapsing in the early afternoon and finally almost dead right when I'm writing this post. As i was watching him in the early death stages I noticed the famous...

This female Religiosa has been having some issues with her claws since she freshly molted to adulthood. The problems started when a katydid bit and crushed her right claw tip. The injury is visible in the pic above. It managed to heal itself, although a little out of place, and remained there...