Are We Over-Feeding Our Mantids?

[MantidBro]

I get what you're saying though about the too much feeding.

I have seen pictures of them on here where they look like they are about to split, and I guess they actually can split open.

That's just scary.

I don't like the dragging abdomen thing.

So I feed mine every day except on a day when I know they had too much the day before.

I've heard people talk on here before about mantid's barfing, and I personally feel like mine do it if they are overfed.

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about but I know it only seems to happen when they have pigged out!!!

But I do think nymphs should be offered food every day unless they are gonna molt ya' know.

I used to feed mine every day but I realized already they're starting to become slower. They used to jump around, now not so much. So I'm backing off on the food a little bit. Gonna base it on how full their abdomens appear to be. Never gonna go more than three days, though. I also don't think it's healthy for them to drag their abdomens or look so large that they appear as if they could split in half.

I had a nymph that kept barfing and I thought it was for a different reason, but maybe it IS because I fed them too much. In my experience, mantids don't have much control over themselves when a prey walks by - they're going to get it whether they're hungry or not. A nymph was actually in the middle of eating when another fruit fly walked by. She dropped the one she was eating and went for that one instead - it's their instinct.

And the way I feed my nymphs now is I put them in a huge cage (it used to be my bearded dragon's but he got a new one) with dead leaves and sticks and stuff then I put some fruit flies in there and let them look for and catch them by themselves. One molted as this happened, coincidentally.

 

[MantidBro]

I feed my mantids as often as they are willing to eat. They seem to know when they can't stuff any more food in and stop.

I check to see if they're interested and remove what they don't eat at the end of the day. If they behave like they feel threatened by the food, I remove it and wait a day or two before trying to offer them food again.

The mantids outside are usually quite hungry, and their body mass has little to do with what's good for them, it has more to do with the prey frequency. Yes, a well-fed mantis will die sooner, but it's only because they are more quickly able to grow to maturity well-fed than a mantis that has great difficulty getting enough body mass to get it to the next instar.

I've personally never had issues with mantids dragging their abdomens around on the ground, seeing as how they're usually hanging at some angle upside down or suspending themselves in a way that their abdomens aren't scraping against something.

My Majesty used to drag her abdomen on the ground. It was too heavy. Honestly I don't think that's healthy, whether some in the wild are this way or not. Because there are many different sizes of mantid in the wild and it's all based on the food available, like you said. Doesn't mean it's healthy. I would say too fat isn't good, and too skinny isn't good. I want my mantids to be in the middle. To do that, I just have to keep a good eye on them - which I always do! Lol

 

[MantidBro]

I am also of the opinion that an overfed mantis is the main cause of egg bound, theory is the more they eat, the more eggs produced and they build up so to speak and therefore are harder to move. Or trying to explain is hard, I stopped feeding everyday as the mantis seems to get so fat as some have noticed that they cannot function propertly and like getting no excercise will make a person fat and unable to move around and also fat human females lose the ability to have children, I mean really fat females, eggbound!

That could have been why Majesty died. She was 8 months old, I figured she was ready to lay an ootheca, but then she died for no apparent reason. Puking and no defecation/urination.

I also use humans as a way to understand how to treat a mantid because we really are the same despite the fact that we're mammals and mantids are invertebrates. Feed too much? Sick. Fat. Weak. Slow. Feed too little? Sick. Thin. Weak. Slow. Feed the perfect amount? Healthy. Average. Strong. Quick.

 

[MantidBro]

Considering many mantids are ambush hunters that camoflage themselves to look like flowers, leaves, twigs, bark, lichen, moss, etc. I don't buy into mantids needing a lot of exercise.

My experience with frogs would lead me to believe that in order to keep your animal healthy (inverts included) you need to make them work for their food. Hand feeding presents no challenge, if you're worried about your mantid getting "exercise" make them hunt for their food by feeding them flying insects or climbing insects.

Feeding frequency in most creatures also depends on the stage of life. Young mantids will likely require more frequent feeding than adult mantids, pregnant females will require more food than males, etc.

I am new to mantids, but this seems common sense to me.

Yeah some wait for food but others actually go looking for it.

I also believe you should make your animal work for food. I've started putting the nymphs in a huge cage where there's leaves and sticks and stuff and then I put the fruit flies in there and let them hunt/catch them on their own. They actually do walk around quite a bit...

 

[MandellaMandy123]

Maybe Majesty was dragging her abdomen because she was about to lay an ooth

 

[MantidBro]

Maybe Majesty was dragging her abdomen because she was about to lay an ooth

Maybe. She ended up dying, maybe she was over-fed and this caused the ootheca to get bound up inside. Apparently this happens according to another mantid owner who replied to this topic. Majesty was about the right age, too... 8 months. 2 months after she became an adult.