Finally, pics of my mantids

[MantidLord]

My extremely large Mantis religiosa female

Mantis religiosa male

Iris oratoria male with Mantis religiosa female

Successful Iris oratoria pair

 

[MantidLord]

Look at the size difference between the Mantis religiosa female and Iris oratoria female!

Another look with different individuals with less dramatic differences

Of course, boys will be boys (Mantis religiosa left and Iris oratoria right)

Yummy. Regardless of which species, the crix are devoured anyway.

Or which organism for that matter!

Hoped you enjoy . And sorry for the bad quality <_<

 

[ismart]

Great pic's! I like comparison photo's!

 

[Rick]

Very nice. Your girl is nice and fat.

 

[MantidLord]

@Ismart: Thank-you. Yeah, I like them too, It's interesting to see how two species with differences like that could live in the same area.

@Rick: thanks, she's really fat and seems to never stop eating. She's laid two ooths so far, and ate her mate and anything else that's gone in her container. She's the only mantis I have that I would never put near the lizards.

 

[Katnapper]

I enjoyed the pics!

 

[spicey]

Nice set of pics! Thanks for sharing with us. That female European is a whopper! (No wonder you won't let her near the lizards... :lol: )

 

[Ntsees]

Lol, I've tried that mating before (oratoria male with a religiosa female). To bad there's no connection unlike some other species combination that can still connect. Wish it was possible (imagine a religiosa with the wings of an oratoria at defense mode).

 

[MantidLord]

Thanks everyone for the replies. I know they're no where near as good as other pics on the forum, but I just wanted to share the mantids that you often here me talk about.

@Spicey: She's a beast. I don't know why she's that large compared to even the other religiosa females I have. I was cleaning containers earlier and had to put her and one of the oratoria females in the same container. I turn around and she's attacking her. Obviously I broke it up, but got bit in the process by the religiosa female. I had to use my finger nail as a buffer between her mandibles and the frightened little oratoria. :blink: I probably brought this on myself, but I figured since the oratoria female was already settled and the religiosa female was dazed and confused, nothing would happen. Thought wrong. I'm surprised I even got her mated.

@Ntsees: Yeah, I knew it wouldn't work out, but the oratoria male was so determined to try, I just let him go at it and when he realized it was hopeless, he just walked off. It seems as if he couldn't "reach" the religiosa female. But I would wonder if I tried it reverse. Though the religiosa male seems to be very conservative and won't even look at an oratoria female.

 

[sbugir]

Nice pics. The color of the oratoria male is amazing. Almost like aqua green/blue. Good stuff.

 

[MantidLord]

Nice pics. The color of the oratoria male is amazing. Almost like aqua green/blue. Good stuff.

You mean female? Thanks a lot though . I wish the green morphs were closer to the greens of Mantis religiosa though, not a fan of the aqua green after almost every mantis has it.

 

[sbugir]

Yep sorry about female is what i meant . I like the green aqua, I just have the typical green european mantids -.-

 

[MantidLord]

Lucky, none of my Europeans are green, they're all brown-tan colored. I actually experiment with some of my oratorias in order to get the brown morphs. Higher humidity and darkness seems to do the trick.