Hi from southern California :)

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rensallar

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Hi all.. I've been reading through dozens of posts during these past couple days, and I'm finally getting around to saying "hi" :) Great forums, and everyone is really helpful.

I always wanted a praying mantis while growing up, but I never got one. I've been out on my own for a while now, and re-discovered my interest in various kinds of bugs and animals. I ended up buying way too many Chinese ooths off ebay. I kept a couple for myself and shared the rest of them with my little cousins and nieces / nephews so they could enjoy the experience as well.

It's been 3 weeks, and the eggs I kept for myself still haven't hatched :( But the ones I gave my parents did hatch. I never saw the first batch.. I tried to explain to my dad how he should care for the nymphs, but they all died! I don't think he did anything really.

When the 2nd egg hatched for them, I rushed over to help care for some of them and to save a few for myself. These nymphs are now 4 days old and doing well. I've separated them all already (I only kept 8). Some of them appear much healthier and more active, but at least all of them are feeding well. I'm hoping some of them will survive into adulthood and start catching some things bigger than fruit flies, heh. I think I'm hooked on this hobby already.

I'm in southern California, just wanted to introduce myself. A lot of people around here say they've seen mantids in the local parks or in their yards.. somehow after all these years, I've never seen one out in the wild.

Couple questions:

1. I bought a big jug of distilled water to use for misting, but for the future, is there any way to just dechlorinate tap water to make it safe for misting? Without using dechlorinating chemicals? I'd be worried those chemicals would harm the mantis also.

2. I tried feeding aphids to the nymphs, but the nymphs seem kinda scared of them. They're as small as the fruit flies, but the aphids walk right into the mantids and they won't eat them? They just run away or move their leg out of the way.. anyone else had this problem?

Thanks!

Kevin

 
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Welcome to the forum, Kevin, from Arizona (an old Asanazi name meaning "better than southern Cal")!

Looks as though you're already off to a good start. Even Chinese nymphs can't each other if they're in seperate pots.! Don't be surprised if some die anyway, though, that's par for the course.

1) Stick to distilled water. It's cheap, if you buy the store's house brand, and unlike dechlorinated water, it is less likely to leave water stains (minerals left after the water has evaporated) all over the pot.

2) The nymphs of some species, like Chinese, ghosts and giant Asians are very sprightly when first hatched, and their first instinct when something bumps into them, whether "prey" or each other, is to run away. So don't worry about the aphids, they'll get the idea of eating them when they are hungry enough.

What size of pot are you using, and what, aside from a mantis and some aphids, have you put in it?

 
Welcome. I use just plain ole tap water with some ReptiSafe added in. No issues. Fruit flies are the best option for small nymphs.

 
Welcome to the forum.

Sorry for the double post, please delete.

 
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Hi Kevin, and welcome to the forum... glad to have you here! :) I use regular tap water and add the aquarium water conditioner that removes chlorine. I've never had a problem either. ;)

 
PhilinYuma said:
Welcome to the forum, Kevin, from Arizona (an old Asanazi name meaning "better than southern Cal")!Looks as though you're already off to a good start. Even Chinese nymphs can't each other if they're in seperate pots.! Don't be surprised if some die anyway, though, that's par for the course.

1) Stick to distilled water. It's cheap, if you buy the store's house brand, and unlike dechlorinated water, it is less likely to leave water stains (minerals left after the water has evaporated) all over the pot.

2) The nymphs of some species, like Chinese, ghosts and giant Asians are very sprightly when first hatched, and their first instinct when something bumps into them, whether "prey" or each other, is to run away. So don't worry about the aphids, they'll get the idea of eating them when they are hungry enough.

What size of pot are you using, and what, aside from a mantis and some aphids, have you put in it?
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Thanks for the info about the aphids. Hopefully they will start eating them soon.. I have tons of free food in my backyard. I had been cutting off a stem from one of the rose bushes and dropping them in the container for the mantids to eat. However, when they didn't seem to want them, then I went and got some flightless fruit flies and they started on those without any problem.

I work in a hospital, so I get sterile specimen containers of various sizes around the job. Some are as small as 200 mL, which gives them closer access to the food. But they seem to get scared of the food really easily in there since there's less room for them to be alone. So in those, I just drop in 3-4 ff's at a time.

Some containers are up to 1.5 Liters, but seems like those are too big for a single nymph.. so I have been looking for something in the middle until they get big enough for those.

I give them a stick and some plants to crawl up on, but they always want to climb up the side of the plastic container instead. Most of them have trouble doing that and fall a lot though. To overcome that problem, I used a little needle and scratched up the inside of the container a little bit to give them more footing. It isn't the most aesthetically pleasing (you can see small scratches when looking inside), but it seems better than letting them get injured by falling too much.

 
Rensallar said:
I give them a stick and some plants to crawl up on, but they always want to climb up the side of the plastic container instead. Most of them have trouble doing that and fall a lot though. To overcome that problem, I used a little needle and scratched up the inside of the container a little bit to give them more footing. It isn't the most aesthetically pleasing (you can see small scratches when looking inside), but it seems better than letting them get injured by falling too much.
Click to expand...
Good idea! ;)

 
hibiscusmile said:
welcome, I let it sit out overnight in open container for clorine to escape if I have to use it. Same way to do for fish tank in a pinch. ;)
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When you let it sit out, does the chlorine evaporate? So the entire container of water is safe to use for the mantises?

Or does the chlorine sink to the bottom and I should only use the top portion?

I can get "sterile water" from work.. they use it in surgeries. Any idea if that is just as safe as distilled water?

Thanks again :)

 
Rensallar said:
When you let it sit out, does the chlorine evaporate? So the entire container of water is safe to use for the mantises?Or does the chlorine sink to the bottom and I should only use the top portion?

I can get "sterile water" from work.. they use it in surgeries. Any idea if that is just as safe as distilled water?

Thanks again :)
Click to expand...
Yes, the chlorine evaporates from the entire contents of the container of water if the lid is left off. I Googled "sterile water" and browsed a little bit about it. You could do the same if you're inclined. It seems to be just high grade distilled water, but one site talked about small percentages of aluminum in the water. I don't really know what to tell you about that. But I wouldn't use it if it were me. No sense in buying/taking (?) and hauling it home from work, when dechlorinated tap water will do just fine.

 
Hey, Doug from S cali as well, ive used regular tap water... thats it lol nothing in it. i used aphids as well but the pin head crickets ate them more often then the mantises did =)

 
Welcome from the O.C.! B)

I think if you use filtered water you'll be okay, but I prefer using distilled water...which I also use for my orchids (flowers - don't have the mantises)

 
Rensallar said:
When you let it sit out, does the chlorine evaporate? So the entire container of water is safe to use for the mantises?Or does the chlorine sink to the bottom and I should only use the top portion?

I can get "sterile water" from work.. they use it in surgeries. Any idea if that is just as safe as distilled water?

Thanks again :)
Click to expand...
Yeah, sterile water is distilled water used in hospitals. It comes in sealed contaniers that have been autoclaved. Once it has been opened and exposed to the air for any length of time, though, it is no longer sterile.

Given the tiny anount of water that the mantids consume, (they obtain most of their fluid inatke from their prey), whether they receive tap or distilled water probably doesn't matter very much, but I use distilled water for misting to avoid water stains on the inside of the deli cup.

 
d17oug18 said:
Hey, Doug from S cali as well, ive used regular tap water... thats it lol nothing in it. i used aphids as well but the pin head crickets ate them more often then the mantises did =)
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Lol about the pinheads.

Besides just wanting to have some mantises as pets, I also got them to put out on my plants to eat the millions of aphids I had.

But they took so long to hatch that it looks like almost all of them got eaten by the ladybugs and ladybug larvae in my backyard. Ah well, looks like I'm gonna have to culture some fruit flies, because my supply I buy from Petco keeps getting exhausted too quickly. The eggs don't hatch/pupate to flies fast enough.

 

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