Mantid gone from seemingly healthy - to clumsy - to almost dead??

[wormholes556]

ok so my indian jewelled flower mantis is basically dead and i have no idea why.

She last ate a decent sized moth about 5 days ago, and i put another one in a night or two ago

she hasnt touched the moth, and today i noticed that she was near the bottom, very clumsily trying to climb things and falling.

one of her legs looked damaged, so i thought maybe she fell when she was about to molt but i can not see any traces of shed skin

she has progressivly got worse as the day has gone on, at the moment she is lying down looking all but dead, with some occasional body movements

sorry about the poor quality image, could only fit my iphone into the enclosure

 

[agent A]

either an infection or pesticide poisoning is my guess

 

[hibiscusmile]

I agree, prob pesticids.

 

[Digger]

Agreed about pesticides. I live in a community which has services come in throughout the season and spray the grass and flowering trees. Unfortunately you never know where a wild-caught treat has been frolicking.

 

[wormholes556]

so you guys think that the moth transmitted the pesticide to the mantis?

thanks for your help, that seems like a plausible explanation as there are fields nearby,

and even an apple orchard so god knows what rubbish they spray those apples with...

 

[Krissim Klaw]

I don't think your problem has anything to do with pesticides.

It sounds more like the mantis desperately needs to shed but for some reason isn't having a good go at it. Since her legs look off she might have been in position and fell near the start and is now too weak to climb back up for another go.. I would try to see if you can get her positioned properly hanging from a very textured surface and up the humidity.

 

[glock34girl]

Interesting. I fed my adult female orchid a moth from outside and three days later I came home to find her dead on the bottom of her enclosure. But she was an adult so didn't need a shed. I had thought she died because she got over heated when the AC broke. But I'd try to get her positioned like Krissim said. Hopefully it's just a needed shed. Good luck.

 

[wormholes556]

Update she died today not sure what the cause was..

 

[dgerndt]

Aw, I'm sorry. ): Sometimes mantids just die, and we don't know why. I once had an adult Chinese that was perfectly healthy, but one day she was just dead on the bottom of her cage.