How long until babies emerge?

[lancaster1313]

I purchased 2 chinese mantis ooths at the Sears garden center. I am hanging 1 outside, and 1 inside in a container. I live in S. Florida and the outside temperature has been around 85F lately, inside we keep it at 75F. The oothecae were in the fridge at Sears. How long can it take at the soonest and at the latest. I am quite excited about my find, I thought they would be harder to find here in Florida.

 

[hibiscusmile]

That all depends on when they were either laid or took out of cold storage, they take a good 6 weeks to hatch when first laid, so u can go from there.

 

[Mr.Mantid]

I purchased 2 chinese mantis ooths at the Sears garden center. I am hanging 1 outside, and 1 inside in a container. I live in S. Florida and the outside temperature has been around 85F lately, inside we keep it at 75F. The oothecae were in the fridge at Sears. How long can it take at the soonest and at the latest. I am quite excited about my find, I thought they would be harder to find here in Florida.

Mine took about a month to hatch.

 

[lancaster1313]

When hatching outdoors, is there a certain time of day or night that chinese mantids usually emerge? I am worried that a bird or lizard would catch them in the act. I was hoping that the outdoor ooth would hatch first because of the warm weather. I am anticipating thier emergence so much, I hope that I will be there outside to witness it!

 

[lancaster1313]

Goodness! one of my ooths is hatching. I brought the outdoor ooth inside and hung it with the other in a container the other day. There was a lizard on the plant that I hung the ooth on. I am glad that I brought it in, but I didn't expect it to hatch so early.

 

[hibiscusmile]

yea, he might of licked them all up, not to be confused with the other post...."mantis licking it's own butt"

 

[lancaster1313]

Lol, in a few minutes I will post some pics of the little ones and containers, with a few questions.

 

[lancaster1313]

I didn't expect this to happen so soon, how long should I wait before moving nymphs to the bigger container. I am modifying it now for ventilation and a feeding port. What you see is just the large container, the ooth container and a pill bottle,(for size).container sizesemerging nymphs

 

[lancaster1313]

Nymphs are filling up the container! When is it safe to move them to the bigger one?

 

[ismart]

If there filling up the container now might be a good time to put them into something bigger! A net cage might be a good idea.

 

[lancaster1313]

All I have at the moment is what is in the pics, but I modified it with a mesh top and feeding port. It used to be full of pretzels from Costco. Will it work? I will be releasing many of them, I just thought I would let them molt a couple of times, lots of lizards around here.

 

[lancaster1313]

I moved them this morning, it was not easy, its a good thing I did this outside. The container that I hatched them in didn't fit inside the large container. I will know better next time and am planning to hatch the other ooth in a larger container. Most of the pics I have seen have chinese ooths hatching in a small container. I definitely didn't need all of those nymphs, I probably released half of them just trying to transfer them. It is a good thing they are already considered native in the US.

 

[lancaster1313]

The other ootheca has erupted. Aaawww maaan! these things sure can produce. I just got done struggling with my first ff culture experience. I am still pleased with the cute nymphs, some already eating. I guess I know how soon an ooth can hatch! Thanks to all the information on this forum, I didn't ruin the oothecae. :lol:

 

[hibiscusmile]

haha, you'll do ok!