OodlesOfNoodles
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- Jul 30, 2011
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I'm sorry to introduce myself on a bit of a downer 
I've been pretty much a lurker though, reading posts and looking at pictures of mantids etc.
I brought my first few nymphs a while and I've had trouble after trouble. I started with 11 nymphs.
6 Popa spurca and 3 Orthodera novaezealandiae I lost two Popa spurca due to a bad moult and today I had a big shock.
Well, everything was fine with maintenance yesterday and I had fed everyone as I do normally etc. This morning I was doing checking the nymphs when I was at the last I looked inside and to my horror no one was home, well looked again I did just to make sure, but nope, she wasn't in there.
I started to panic and proceeded to look around in the immediate vicinity for any sign of her but to no avail. So then I thought that maybe she would of climbed up high so I started to look up the walls....nothing was there, until out of the corner of my eye I spotted a house spider type thing. Not taking much notice of it and thinking “Mantis would own you in a second” so I ignored it and continued to look around the cages to make sure again.
But as I was doing so something was screaming at me to look again at the spider, and suddenly I felt really uneasy. So I got a foot stool and had a closer look....well when I saw what I did my heart sank and I felt instantly sick...in it's clutches was my poor beautiful little nymph, I didn’t spot it at first because it already looked like it had made a meal of it and the poor mantis looked half of it's normal size, while the spider looked twice it's size... all because of small gap where the lid hadn't closed properly so it was all my fault.
So I stood there for a good few mins trying to decide what to do,, immediately I shooed the thing down and got it to released her. I had contemplated trying to feed it to one of the bigger nymphs but then I realized that the spider was just doing what was normal to it and feeding it off wouldn't make me feel any better, as much as it upset me. Plus I didn't want to risk my only nymphs and I didn't want to feed that gross thing to them anyway. So I released it even though it preyed on the weak and the vulnerable mantis, it was out of her mini-habitat and was probably trying to find somewhere safe. I cant but wonder if she had tried to over power it and lost or it had caught her...probably the latter.
So I've decided that I more than likely wont get any more mantis at present.
I still feel sick looking at the thing. :angry:
:no: :no: :no:
I've been pretty much a lurker though, reading posts and looking at pictures of mantids etc.
I brought my first few nymphs a while and I've had trouble after trouble. I started with 11 nymphs.
6 Popa spurca and 3 Orthodera novaezealandiae I lost two Popa spurca due to a bad moult and today I had a big shock.
Well, everything was fine with maintenance yesterday and I had fed everyone as I do normally etc. This morning I was doing checking the nymphs when I was at the last I looked inside and to my horror no one was home, well looked again I did just to make sure, but nope, she wasn't in there.
I started to panic and proceeded to look around in the immediate vicinity for any sign of her but to no avail. So then I thought that maybe she would of climbed up high so I started to look up the walls....nothing was there, until out of the corner of my eye I spotted a house spider type thing. Not taking much notice of it and thinking “Mantis would own you in a second” so I ignored it and continued to look around the cages to make sure again.
But as I was doing so something was screaming at me to look again at the spider, and suddenly I felt really uneasy. So I got a foot stool and had a closer look....well when I saw what I did my heart sank and I felt instantly sick...in it's clutches was my poor beautiful little nymph, I didn’t spot it at first because it already looked like it had made a meal of it and the poor mantis looked half of it's normal size, while the spider looked twice it's size... all because of small gap where the lid hadn't closed properly so it was all my fault.
So I stood there for a good few mins trying to decide what to do,, immediately I shooed the thing down and got it to released her. I had contemplated trying to feed it to one of the bigger nymphs but then I realized that the spider was just doing what was normal to it and feeding it off wouldn't make me feel any better, as much as it upset me. Plus I didn't want to risk my only nymphs and I didn't want to feed that gross thing to them anyway. So I released it even though it preyed on the weak and the vulnerable mantis, it was out of her mini-habitat and was probably trying to find somewhere safe. I cant but wonder if she had tried to over power it and lost or it had caught her...probably the latter.
So I've decided that I more than likely wont get any more mantis at present.
I still feel sick looking at the thing. :angry:
:no: :no: :no:
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