Molting?

[FendersRule]

Anyone have any pictures of what it looks like when Mantids are about to molt?

I usually feed my mantis with tweezers. He's an L6 Spurca, and he's been eating houseflies and butterflies for the past couple weeks. However, since it appears that he is close to molting (I think), I just placed the last fly into the aquarium (it's a 5.5 gallon tank). The fly has been in there for two days, and I just found it laying on the ground dead this afternoon...so the Mantid I suppose wasn't hungry enough to go fetch it.

He's been hanging on the wooden stick for the past couple days that goes from the floor to the top of the aquarium. He could easily walk up to the steel grating at the top of the aquarium if he wanted to, but I guess he prefers the twig for his molt. I'm only guessing he's close to molting due to his buds. Maybe it's normal for Spurca buds to be flared like that:

 

[lancaster1313]

I have never kept that species, but my mantids' wing buds can be swollen for quite a while before molting. :mellow:

I usually find that the wing buds tend to lift away from the body when the molt is a week to a few days away.

Also, many of mine seem to keep their genitailia noticeably open for around 12 to 24 hours prior to their last couple of molts. :blink:

 

[Precarious]

May not have eaten because it's full. Sometimes they will kill a fly if it's annoying them.

My Popas generally preferred to molt from a stick and this looks like a good one. Horizontal branches are even better.

 

[FendersRule]

I knew it! I knew something was going on....Check out what I just found when I got home:

Just like with my last mantis; molting happens so fast that it just comes and goes.

 

[gripen]

is he an adult now?

 

[FendersRule]

L7 now, I believe. No wings quite yet.

 

[gripen]

nice mine are L4/L5.

 

[agent A]

my female is L7 and male is L6

 

[Precarious]

You did it! Good job.

 

[meaganelise9]

This was helpful to me too. My Popa is about L4 and being so long and awkward, he seems to have a hard time getting to the top even when he seems to be trying. I guess I'll just give him a bigger stick perhaps.