Obese Mantis

[Inkie]

My female Stagmomantis limbata is pregnant (mated her about a week ago). She is incredibly hungry. No matter how much I feed her a day, she still goes for bugs and strikes at the glass when she sees another mantis being fed. Her abdomen is stretched to the max, it almost looks like she's going to explode. But she still acts like she's starving... is there a downside to feeding her too much? Can she overeat?

 

[Rick]

They know when to stop. Most of her bulk is eggs. They are producing eggs whether mated or not.

 

[Inkie]

Is parthenogenesis rare in mantids?

 

[happy1892]

Is parthenogenesis rare in mantids?

I do not think it is rare. Go to Ukmantisforums home page and look for the article about Parthenogenesis in mantids. It will show you some mantises that are parthenogenetic (not all of them always make fertile oothecae without mating I read). I cannot get into my account even though I think I am typing in the right password so I cannot link you to an article. Last time I looked there were only two pages of articles which is maybe around 10 articles.

http://www.ukmantisforums.co.uk/content.php