food needs for Idolomantis diabolica

[Schloaty]

Hey all,

I've read that Idolo's have to be fed on flying insects (i.e. no crickets, meal worms, etc).

Is this true?

I ask becuase I used to hear the same thing about Gongy's, then later heard that several people use crickets with them...

I have a couple Idolo's coming this week...and I'll be fine getting moths, etc, at the porch light for at least the next two months....but then I'll have to start buying food. So I'm just planning ahead here...I may have to find a supply of large flying feeders somewhere on line.

 

[Entomo-logic]

I have trouble getting my Gongylus to accept anything that is not frantically flapping around the cage and I hear Idolomantis is very similar, as are all the other members of the Family Empusidae. I can get them (Gongylus) to accept mealworms and wax moth larva but I usually have to decapitate them and expose some of the gut track and hemolymph and touch the palps of the mantis so they get a taste of it before they accept the food. I REFUSE to feed my mantids crickets anymore because there are more and more reports of a virus that is effecting captive cricket populations across the United States and the virus may be transferable from crickets to mantids because Orthopterans and Mantodea are very closely related cladistically speaking. In the summer months I collect moths and butterflies for my mantids but during those long Nebraska winters I culture Wax moths(Wax worms) which is the primary feeder during that time. Hope some of this proves useful.

 

[ismart]

They don't have to be fed flying insects, but they prefer flying insects. Idolo's can be picky at times even with flying insects. If i were you, i would invest in house flies, and bluebottle flies. You could always culture some different moth species. I think Brian is selling some.

 

[Rick]

Plenty of vendors selling bb flies.

 

[hibiscusmile]

Plenty of vendors selling bb flies.

You know it...buzz buzz :tt2:

 

[angelofdeathzz]

people don't feed them crickets because its supposed to adversely effect the ooth,they love there flies, mine eat 2-3 a day each!

 

[hibiscusmile]

I have given my idolos a cricket now and then, didn't hurt em, didn't hurt em at all!

 

[guapoalto049]

I have given my idolos a cricket now and then, didn't hurt em, didn't hurt em at all!

I have fed my Gongylus wild caught crickets for the past few months. They typically only take them when on the hungry side, for instance after a molt. No problems with any so far.

 

[PhilinYuma]

I have trouble getting my Gongylus to accept anything that is not frantically flapping around the cage and I hear Idolomantis is very similar, as are all the other members of the Family Empusidae. I can get them (Gongylus) to accept mealworms and wax moth larva but I usually have to decapitate them and expose some of the gut track and hemolymph and touch the palps of the mantis so they get a taste of it before they accept the food. I REFUSE to feed my mantids crickets anymore because there are more and more reports of a virus that is effecting captive cricket populations across the United States and the virus may be transferable from crickets to mantids because Orthopterans and Mantodea are very closely related cladistically speaking. In the summer months I collect moths and butterflies for my mantids but during those long Nebraska winters I culture Wax moths(Wax worms) which is the primary feeder during that time. Hope some of this proves useful.

I'm sure that your refusal to feed crickets is one of your inalienable rights, but when you scare newbies with pseudoscience, that isn't so cool. The virus that you mention appears to be endemic to brown crickets, Acheta domesticus, and no one has suggested that they can infect mantids -- they can't even infect other crickets so far. I assume that when you were feeding crickets, you took the normal precaution of feeding them for a few days after purchase, before offering them to your mantids. If crix are still alive and healthy after that time, there is little reason to worry about them.

If I sound unduly cross about this it is because I grew tired, a long time ago, of hearing disease laden, carotene laced crickets blamed for the problems caused by bad husbandry.

Crickets of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your lives!

 

[LauraMG]

Preach on brotha man! :lol: I've never had a problem with crickets, I just don't like the little buggers

 

[PhilinYuma]

Preach on brotha man! :lol: I've never had a problem with crickets, I just don't like the little buggers

Just between you and me, Laura, neither do I! I feed houseflies, bluebottles and roaches and bees. I'm getting too old for the four mile walk required to pick up crix!

 

[hibiscusmile]

hahah, four mile walk, it's the bending I hate!

 

[Mex_Ghost]

Geting back on feeding... I fed my Idolos with bees, BB, butterflies, Drangon Flies, and hand feeding crickets, I didn´t have any problems with crickets.

 

[angelofdeathzz]

Just between you and me, Laura, neither do I! I feed houseflies, bluebottles and roaches and bees. I'm getting too old for the four mile walk required to pick up crix!

I also only feed bb's and house flies, and the occasional moth-butterfly if I can catch them. even my chinese love them! as far as cricket's go there way to smelly to me and I do fear the old myth about them making my gongy ooth's unfertile I'm not sure if it's true but why take the chance when it seem's all mantis love a big fat bb.

 

[paddythemic]

What are your methods for hand feeding them crickets. Do you grab it by the leg with tweezers and hold it in front of them or do you tie a string around it and dangle?

This generally works for my orchid and giant; but my idolos seem like they just want to "shadow box" whatever I try to hand feed them.