Outdoor mantid with larvae in abdomen- Has anyone heard of this?

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mcervig@yahoo.com

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An outdoor iris oratoria was fine 2 days ago. Today her abdomen is almost completely hollowed out. I looked with my ophthalmoscope and saw what looked like fruit fly larvae moving. She is still alive and I put her in a spot that I can find her when she dies. I freaked out and bleached my hands and everything I touched.

When she dies how do I safely look at her belly to see what is inside?

How do I dispose of her?

Should I pull out and kill the basil plant she is on?

What the h*#$&(*&R^& could it be?

There are many bees, spiders, and other insects around now. My first instinct was that she ate a bee because she is very aggressive.

How could other insect larvae get into her while she is still alive?

Such as to see. Sorry I can't take small pictures to show.

 
The larvae might be a parasite that was in prey the mantis ate, like this horse hair worm.

praying-mantis-horsehair-worm.jpg


 
Most likely parasitoid Diptera, tachniid fly for example. They do no harm to human so don't be worried; you can either freeze your mantis to kill everything or leave it alone and allow the flies to complete their life cycle.

 
Thanks for the link Rick. The abdomen of the mantid in my backyard looks exactly like the picture of the green mantid (Carolina I think). This is awful!

We had extreme storms and flooding here, so there are many new bugs I've never seen before in my yard now.

I don't want this threat to live out its life cycle!

So, should I try to remove the other mantids that are in my basil? Are they in danger?

 
You'll have a fairly equal chance of seeing parasitism even if you move them. The flies are mobile and actively search for hosts as that's the only way they can continue their life cycle.

 
yeah, you don't have to worry too much about washing and bleaching anything. If your other mantids already have the parasite inside them, there's nothing you can do about it, really. Moving them may just bring the nasty little ass munching grubs into your house.
These kind of things are my worst nightmare, I'm sorry you had to be faced with such an event. Such are the risks of living in "the wilds", though :<
My figures are crossed for your other lovely mantids <3

 
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Help!

It happened again!!!

How does this happen?

This beautiful mantid laid eggs before she was murdered. Will her eggs be ok? Or do these fly eggs stay dormant for a long time? Can they live in an ooth? I know nothing about this! I feel so helpless!

I am ready to move the 5 females I have outside to my bedroom plants.

Are my cats in danger? Should I start a new topic?

 
It would be best to keep your mantids in net cages from now on. That will keep the darned flies from attacking the mantids.

Freeze all your mantids that have the maggots and start new. Where do you live? Im in Maine and I see this happening to caterpillars only. Ive kept afew mantids loose in my garden and no attacks.

 
These are most certainly NOT eggs moving around...

This was getting common when I was in Las Vegas working with I. oratoria. The parasitoids appear to be some sort of tachinid. What's interesting is the fact that I. oratoria are obviously introduced, so I wonder whether these tachinids are introduced or native and just able to jump ship. The eggs of your mantis (of fertile) should be fine. There aren't any larva in the eggs as they only develop inside the mantis and then exit in order to pupate.

Also, it's possible that these mantids were parasitized earlier in their development stage as opposed to as an adult. For one, imagine an adult mantis allowing a fly a little smaller than a house fly to oviposit on it (unless the action takes less than a second, it's unlikely). Second, it takes a while for the larva to develop inside, so targeting an adult mantis which may have only a week or so left to live isn't really an advantage. Basically, your females outside should be fine.

And your cats are fine.

 
Thank you! That explains why 1 was murdered in the basil while the rest are fine in the basil. The other one was murdered in my pomegranate tree.

 
Ooth hatched from female with parasitoid flies. I was worried about the ooth. It hatched, and the offspring are beautiful!

However, now they are becoming pre-sub adult and sub adult. 3 out of 4 have minor to moderate green bleeding after molting. It's almost like human scurvy! It is like they have a vitamin deficiency. My other ooths' offspring are fine, so it is not environmental. It makes sense that they were depleted of nutrition from the murderous parasitoid flies.

Has anyone experiences this?

 
I dont know why you people have to put the pic of that awful worm up all the time. :taz: LOL. I do know that when something has a boo boo, that if a fly gets in it

where it is rotting a bit they will lay eggs in the hole so the eggs can eat off the diseased part. Thats all that happened here.

 
Parasitic flies are pretty common with larger predatory inverts, there are varieties that feed on large orb web spiders, these parasites may attack a mantis as it is molting, and it is vulnerable, if your mantis is bleeding from the face, it may be its eyes, move to a net cage as this is the result of eye damage. Destroy all larvae you find, and if you remove one from a healthier looking mantis it may be fine, as some are blood suckers.

 

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