Are the crickets attacking my mantids?

[Insects in Art]

I've moved on from fruit flies to size small crickets for my chinese and giant african nymphs . Great - they're easy to handle and provide a decent meal. They even climb to the top where the mantids like to sit. I'm buying silent brown crickets from Ebay.

But are the crickets likely to attack my mantids? I had to take them camping last week and lost a couple - could be because of the camping or was it the crickets? I left them in the car btw. I've seen a couple of crickets dragging fly corpses around, so assume that they don't mind a bit of insect flesh.

Thanks,

Andrew

 

[ImTheBugFreak]

I am not sure usually a mantid will scare the cricket away or move away from the cricket if it does not eat it! I personally wouldn't move my mantids around to much as you can stress them out!

 

[lancaster1313]

I never leave crickets in the same container with any pet for more than a couple of hours. If the pet doesn't eat all of the crickets in that time, they will be removed. Crickets will take advantage of any weakness that the predator has, if they get the chance.

Containers left in a car can get much hotter than it is outdoors, a touch of sun can cook your creatures.

 

[ShieldMantid1997]

Like likebugs said never leave them in if they aren't eaten, i've had pets as big as a fully grown beardie bitten.

 

[PhilinYuma]

I've moved on from fruit flies to size small crickets for my chinese and giant african nymphs . Great - they're easy to handle and provide a decent meal. They even climb to the top where the mantids like to sit. I'm buying silent brown crickets from Ebay.

But are the crickets likely to attack my mantids? I had to take them camping last week and lost a couple - could be because of the camping or was it the crickets? I left them in the car btw. I've seen a couple of crickets dragging fly corpses around, so assume that they don't mind a bit of insect flesh.

Thanks,

Andrew

Yes

 

[Rick]

I never leave crickets in the same container with any pet for more than a couple of hours. If the pet doesn't eat all of the crickets in that time, they will be removed. Crickets will take advantage of any weakness that the predator has, if they get the chance.

Containers left in a car can get much hotter than it is outdoors, a touch of sun can cook your creatures.

This fear involving crickets is blown way out of proportion. Unless the mantis is molting there is no danger. I have never lost a mantis to crickets and I never removed any that were uneaten unless the mantis was just about to molt.

 

[mantiscraze]

Okay, so being a n00b, I've had some problems with oversized crickets. I lost a flower mantis to one. Not sure how exactly it happened, but I found the cricket munching on the mantis the next time I looked. I just fed a budwing (sorry, not keep tracking of the L #'s) a medium sized cricket that was extremely feisty, it chewed the raptor arm off the mantis even after the mantis had its death grip around it's body.

Here is what I learned, if I think the mantis is going to have a problem tackling down a cricket (tenacious mandibles, chewed through the plastic bag container from Petsmart), I rip the head off first before I drop it it. I know it's cruel...

 

[ShieldMantid1997]

Okay, so being a n00b, I've had some problems with oversized crickets. I lost a flower mantis to one. Not sure how exactly it happened, but I found the cricket munching on the mantis the next time I looked. I just fed a budwing (sorry, not keep tracking of the L #'s) a medium sized cricket that was extremely feisty, it chewed the raptor arm off the mantis even after the mantis had its death grip around it's body.

Here is what I learned, if I think the mantis is going to have a problem tackling down a cricket (tenacious mandibles, chewed through the plastic bag container from Petsmart), I rip the head off first before I drop it it. I know it's cruel...

sometimes i do the same thing, because the crickets still run around for a while