Best species for Me?

Rick · Apr 12, 2011

Mantids as a feeder just doens't make any sense. You say you have to get rid of feeders now, why add another? If you really think you want to do this just buy some cheap chinese ootheca online and stick those in there until they hatch. That way makes much more sense than raising mantids to do the same thing. It will be cheaper too.

bl4ckgixxer600 · Apr 12, 2011

Ntsees said:
I don't know what stage of the mantid you're going to use as feeders. If you plan on raising mantids to adulthood and then using them as feeders, all I have to say to you is good luck. With your intentional raising and use of adult mantids as feeders, I'm pretty sure you'll end up quitting at round one because getting mantids to adulthood with the intention as feeders is not an easy task. The time, energy, and money you put forth getting a mantid to adulthood is high. Even if you do succeed, you'll only get a few adults from the hundreds that may hatch (mass producing mantids is tough). You can do what you wish if you have that kind of time, but the way I see it, it's a total waste of energy put forth.

You all are totally misunderstanding what I'm plainly saying/asking. I want to have mantids as pets, but I do not however want a million of them, thats where my cham comes in. L2's and up would work as feeders. Time and energy wise, compared to my dubias and crix they're going to be cake. Money? the only thing I'm going to be spending on is the innitial purchase. All I wanted to know is what mantid species would better flourish in my conditions.

bl4ckgixxer600 · Apr 12, 2011

Rick said:
Mantids as a feeder just doens't make any sense. You say you have to get rid of feeders now, why add another? If you really think you want to do this just buy some cheap chinese ootheca online and stick those in there until they hatch. That way makes much more sense than raising mantids to do the same thing. It will be cheaper too.

I dont need to get rid of feeders, I would like to control them. When you have a bin that is over populated it creates problems. Thats where the mantids come in. Basically whats going to happen is natural ecology that I get to control. Prey gets eaten by predator B, controlling prey. Predator B gets eaten by predator A who is higher up on the food chain, controlling predator B. And then I get to control how many predator B gets eaten by predator A It's population management. The rest is on previous post.

patrickfraser · Apr 12, 2011

Watch out for predator "C"

PhilinYuma · Apr 13, 2011

patrickfraser said:
Watch out for predator "C"

Yes indeed!

O.K., ILM You've been talking about "millions" of mantids. Even if you were talking about thousands, you obviously have a lot to learn about raising members of this order, and I am going to help you. For real.

What you should always do in a case like this is a feasability study. Here's how you do it. Buy as many Chinese ooths -- they're the cheapest available and they grow quite large -- as you have 12" net cube cages for. You are not going to feed any of the mantids from this study. Count the number of new born nymphs and the number of fruit flies that you feed them. Do the same with every instar. In the wild, for pretty obvious reasons, the several hundred nymphs should produce one or zero adults. Two mated adults might yield 6 ooths, and if one adult survived from every ooth and mated successfully, that three pairs, breeding at the same rate, would yield 4,374 offspring in the seventh year. Yours will not be subject to predation, but they will fall victim to a number of unnatural stressors, so you will probably want to start feeding them at an earlier age, before you get down to six adults (if that) after five months work. .

Once you have done, so, though, you will have to wait a long time for a new bunch unless you hatch an ooth every month, which will involve 12 cubes and 12 square feet of space plus daily feeding and care. And all of this to feed a few chameleons? Give it a try instead of arguing your case, and let us know in six months how the study works out. Tell us how many ooths you started with and how many, say L5 nymphs you ended up with and at a cost of how much food and time. And remember not to name them.