Emergency problem with fruit flies

[Lalaland]

Sounds great! Haha thanks  :clap:

 

[Lalaland]

@Zeppy44

 

[Lalaland]

I think I will be trying mealworms they seem easier to take care of and you can keep them dormant for months!! My first fly hatched out of my culture it was very tiny and I accidentally smashed it  I fed Mr.mantis a cricket last night and he LOVED it he is not hungry today

 

[cwebster]

In addition to fruit flies and crickets, would try catching moths. When i used to raise tree frogs from eggs to tiny hatchling tadpoles, who then morphed into tiny little frogs, i used to put a light outside and just scoop up the tiny moths. I dont know how nutritious a mantis wiuld find them but the frogs loved them. BTW you can get really tiny mealworms online for tiny mantises.

 

[CosbyArt]

I too will be catching wild feeders in the summer since I do it for fun anyway lol I use my hands I have mastered the art of catching grasshoppers and crickets and an assortment of tons of things. Can I feed them small grasshoppers? Thank you for all of the help.

Sure mantids like grasshoppers, katydids, and related - that is of proper size for the mantid. Your welcome and best of luck.

@Sarah K

I have had so much trouble flash freezing my flies that I just gave up on it all together. 50% of the time I killed the darn things no matter how much I timed it and tried to find the optimum time. Maybe I'm just bad at it! Also with a culture if you freeze them you may end up shaking just as many already dead flies as alive but chilled ones into the new culture. 

Either way frozen or not they are a pain to transport around.

Yeah I do not recommend freezing/cooling flies for that reason, and I never do either. If you have the flightless variety they shake easy enough from one culture into another and is really fast/easy to do. If they are the wild/flying variety you just need a pooter type device, I make these, and it is just about as fast and easy.

I think I will be trying mealworms they seem easier to take care of and you can keep them dormant for months!! My first fly hatched out of my culture it was very tiny and I accidentally smashed it  I fed Mr.mantis a cricket last night and he LOVED it he is not hungry today

Mealworms are easy and once started mine took care of themselves until I got rid of them, see here for details. I never could get my mantids to eat them no matter what I tried though, and I did everything I could think of/read/and advice tried.

Waxworms are similar in ease of care, but do need some cleaning between generations, see here. The only downfall is they are so high in fat that they are like junk food and good for a treat but not the mantids primarily food; although, all my mantids love the wax moths (waxworm adults) but few would touch the waxworms themselves.

Nice to your mantis enjoyed the cricket, and likely was a feast for him.

 

[MantisRCool]

I've been working on breeding and culturing all the various feeders for a few months now. So this is my two cents as a beginner to another beginner.

Mealworms - easy as pie to keep and breed. Oat meal and some potatoes (or mine LOVE cauliflower) and minimal life cycle sorting and you can quickly have more worms then you will ever know what to do with.

Fruit Flies - Just as easy as meal worms but a bit more upkeep. Basic culture medium (there is a massive sticky thread on all of the recipes) is dirt cheap and easy to make. Honestly moving flies from one culture to the next to keep them going is the hardest part. This doubles in difficulty as soon as you are breeding the wild flying variety.

Crickets - these have been the hardest in my opinion and they take forever. You have to have some manner of heating pad or light if you want the eggs to hatch. I have not had a single egg hatch at room temp. Also keeping the laying dirt moist is a bit of a hassle. I tend to wet my laying trays twice a day. I also have a separate container to hatch the eggs in so I can keep the sizes sorted. I accidentally fried my first batch of babies by leaving the heating light on too long after they hatched. The second hatch are doing well but they are growing much slower then I expected. In the end my personal opinion on crickets is they are not worth the hassle if you can just buy them.

Black Solider Flies - Still working on this one but the phoenix worms to get it started are a bit pricey and the adults only live about 8 days or so. There is also a good amount of set up to get a proper container for them to live and breed in.

Roaches - These are illegal in Canada so I can't speak to these. 

Wax Worms - Seem similar to the BSF in setup and care but also perhaps less finicky. I will likely try these some day.

Wow roaches are illegal in Canada? That sucks, I don't know what I would do without roaches lol

 

[Teamonger]

Wow roaches are illegal in Canada? That sucks, I don't know what I would do without roaches lol

They sure are, heavy fines if you are caught with them I hear from some of my reptile having friends. As much as it sucks it makes sense. We don't have cockroaches natively here so far as I know (I've never seen one in my life) so importing them seems fool hearty as just a few escaping can cause all sorts of problems.

 

[CosbyArt]

They sure are, heavy fines if you are caught with them I hear from some of my reptile having friends. As much as it sucks it makes sense. We don't have cockroaches natively here so far as I know (I've never seen one in my life) so importing them seems fool hearty as just a few escaping can cause all sorts of problems.

Amazing to hear that, I guess it goes to show the climate isn't fit for natives for sure. Just don't tell me wife you don't have cockroaches, as she hates them with a passion and might want to move.

 

[Teamonger]

Amazing to hear that, I guess it goes to show the climate isn't fit for natives for sure. Just don't tell me wife you don't have cockroaches, as she hates them with a passion and might want to move.

Hehe, Don't dare tell her that Iceland has nearly no insects to speak of then  No biting insects, no ants, no cockroaches, not a lot of anything.

To be fair we do have cockroaches here but they are introduced as far as I know. They are definitely not a common site regardless. I know there are some near the harbor in the city as I believe they came in on ships and all that.

 

[MantisRCool]

They sure are, heavy fines if you are caught with them I hear from some of my reptile having friends. As much as it sucks it makes sense. We don't have cockroaches natively here so far as I know (I've never seen one in my life) so importing them seems fool hearty as just a few escaping can cause all sorts of problems.

We don't have native roaches here either (well maybe some, I'm not sure), but they would die off in winter anyways if anyone would let them out like all the other insects that like warm weather. Plus our government doesn't give a dang lol.

 

[Lalaland]

i could just catch the roaches i find in the locker room at school..... yeah that's a thing.. fun fact i once put a roach on a girl I did not like .... no one appreciated my creativity for that one but hey if you want to get back at someone just put bugs on them you can't be fined or suspended especially if you found them at your school ....

 

[CosbyArt]

Hehe, Don't dare tell her that Iceland has nearly no insects to speak of then  No biting insects, no ants, no cockroaches, not a lot of anything.

To be fair we do have cockroaches here but they are introduced as far as I know. They are definitely not a common site regardless. I know there are some near the harbor in the city as I believe they came in on ships and all that.

I won't, I think I would be lost with such little insect life.

Yes cities are cities I guess no matter where you are - too much available for a roach not to infest eventually one way or another.

i could just catch the roaches i find in the locker room at school.....

I would highly advise against that as they have been feeding on waste and material indoors that would be passed on to any mantid (likely including bacteria) and most likely would be toxic. See here for some details..

Cockroaches are omnivorous scavengers and will consume any organic food source available to them. Although they prefer sweets, meats and starches, they are also known to consume other items such as hair, books and decaying matter. Cockroaches eat what is available to them: cockroaches that inhabit sewers feed on sewage, while species living on dead trees consume decaying wood.

If you find the wood cockroaches (Parcoblatta sp.) outdoors that would be a safer bet; however, if they eat treated lumber, plywood (glue resins), or other material they would be a potential risk as well. Personally I would just avoid "wild" roaches as they all have too much risk, which is kind of funny as I'll feed my pets almost any wild caught prey.

 

[Lalaland]

I probably should have stated I was joking as dirty socks and whatever else is in my trash hole of a school is not good nutrition plus poison for the roaches it was merely a joke rest assured I'm not that dumb @CosbyArt

 

[CosbyArt]

I probably should have stated I was joking as dirty socks and whatever else is in my trash hole of a school is not good nutrition plus poison for the roaches it was merely a joke rest assured I'm not that dumb @CosbyArt

Okay, glad to hear you aren't considering them as feeders. I've read others ask similar questions, due to a lack of options or ease of capture. Either way I would not think of it as being dumb; however, just not informed of the potential dangers.

 

[Zeppy44]

I probably should have stated I was joking as dirty socks and whatever else is in my trash hole of a school is not good nutrition plus poison for the roaches it was merely a joke rest assured I'm not that dumb @CosbyArt

:lol:  At first I wanted to warm you fast.  Then I just started laughing at the image of you late for class repeatedly cause of insect hunting in the halls.   :clap:  By the time I stopped laughing I figured you were too organized and passionate about your mantis to do that to them.    So big thank you for the fun.

 

[Lalaland]

Hahaha I'm glad you had some fun with it. My Spanish teacher the most strict teacher I have let me search her room for fifteen minutes looking for a huge wolf spider that was on her desk and they all know I'm into bugs (tiny school) yes I have put too much work into Mr Mantis and I love him too much too be that careless. I'm glad my jokes made someone laugh! @Zeppy44

 

[Lalaland]

Imagine it I have too many tardies so the principal talks to me and it goes a little like this..

him- why are you so late all the time

me- funny story I'm cheap and I am a single mother too a mantis and he eats live food soooo I catch bugs at the school during passing period for him ...think of it as an extra curricular ... call me if you need to actually take care of the bugs I can use it as an excuse for more mantids..

him- *speechless*

well it's clear that I am 1. A dork and 2. Not a writer 

 

[Zeppy44]

:clap:           Maybe extra credit or such?

Imagine it I have too many tardies so the principal talks to me and it goes a little like this..

him- why are you so late all the time

me- funny story I'm cheap and I am a single mother too a mantis and he eats live food soooo I catch bugs at the school during passing period for him ...think of it as an extra curricular ... call me if you need to actually take care of the bugs I can use it as an excuse for more mantids..

him- *speechless*

well it's clear that I am 1. A dork and 2. Not a writer