Blueish mantis!

izbiggs · Jul 24, 2017

I wish the photos were better so that you guys could see the blue tinted nature of her whole body, but these will have to do. She had her last few molts in a container with a blue lid and is a blue and purple tinted mantis! That makes me interested in experimenting with keeping mantises in different colored environment from nymphs to see how colored they could become. This is an adult female agrionina.

I exclusively fed her on my hand as well, so she always wants to come out of her container. What a highly adaptable mantis! I just need about 100 nymphs to raise in order to satiate my newfound curiosity in this species!

Shoutout to @yankeeman1421 for this beautiful girl!

look carefully.. she's blue!

her blue face spot!

you can see how blue her leg and purple the edge of her wing is in this photo

Sarah K · Jul 24, 2017

Very pretty!

yankeeman1421 · Jul 24, 2017

Congrats!!!!

hopefully u find a male for her to breed with

River Dane · Jul 25, 2017

Wow! She's stunning! Very pretty mantis, definitely try to breed her.

As far as coloration goes, idk what species you have, but I think it does effect some species. I found a white mantis (Stagmomantis Californica) and kept him in a habitat with white stones and sticks, hoping for him to maintain his white color, and he kept his white color! Unfortunately, I can't guarantee that had to do with his habitat or his DNA, and he recently died due to ants swarming his habitat.

After that, I tried turning one of my females white to see if she would change, and I saw her color change to a slightly lighter green. She hasn't turned completely white though.

Good luck with your colorful adventures!

CosbyArt · Jul 25, 2017

@izbiggs She looks great as is.

Indeed I've had trouble capturing coloration too, in isopods specifically. No matter the light source, my DSLR settings, and everything else - it doesn't capture it like I see it in real life.

Ha, I've talked to several other members about doing a color experiment years ago too. We concluded the best way to do it was with cheap construction paper, wrapped around the back of a habitat. Although the mantids are limited in their coloring due to their pigments, it is amazing the variety of wild Carolina's (Stagmomantis carolina) I've found and posted in my mantid thread.

If you do get around to trying the experiment be sure to share some photos.