Eye Injury - Is my Mantid in Danger?

[Gwan-Thwei]

Hey all

In my last thread i had expressed concern about bug spray in the backyard and didn't get much feedback about it. After waiting a week and a half for the pesticides to wash out and for life in my backyard to recover, i captured a cricket and fed it to my adult chinese mantid. She didn't show any signs of illness, and she was still just as active as she was before i fed her, so i decided to put her out in the backyard again.

A few weeks go by and i didn't see her, so i believed that she had found a better location and had moved there. But when my Father was out doing yardwork, i saw her again. Her antennae were very short, less than half an inch, one of the feet on her raptorals was completely gone, but most worrying of all was a large purple streak across one of her eyes. I'm thinking that when Father got out the weedwhacker, she might have gotten hit by the plastic line.


(sorry, my phone's camera is really bad. This was the best one i could get)



I was worried, so i checked around and decided a layer of honey over the scratch would stop any potential infection. Her eye is still intact, but i don't think she can see out of it very well, if at all. She's still an excellent hunter, so i'm not worried about her taking care of herself, I'm more worried about this odd mark spreading and ruining the eye entirely, or worse, if the mark indicates more severe damage.

As always, any help is appreciated. Care instructions, tips for what to look out for, assurance that she's fine, anything works.

 

[CosbyArt]

She may have been hit by the trimmer line, or she got in a fight with something too - such as a loose animal like a cat. The missing tarsus on her front raptor isn't anything major, as it happens often. It will cause her to walk a bit odd though, almost with a limp (In time she should be able to adapt to that quite well).

I can't tell in the photo the damage at all; however, it sounds like her eye was recently injured by the coloring. It should scab up on it's own, if you want to try the honey trick there as well it doesn't seem to bother them much (I've done it on mantids eyes myself accidentally when feeding honey). If she is still able to catch prey I wouldn't worry to much, mantids really are a hardy bunch.

Sounds like you should keep her inside for a few days to see if she needs any further assistance. Then if she still doing well and catching prey you can decide to let her go or not. I do now in my area the night temps are in the 40s so all insects are dying off, which means food will be scarce or non-extant (not to mention what it will do to the mantid) - so keep that in mind as it is fall, not sure where you are located as America doesn't narrow it down much.