problems after molting

[londonmantid]

hi everyone

one of my nimphs, just molted to L4, but after molting he lost one of his second leg tarsus. one of his antenae and seems his two back legs are not strong enough, although hes still using them.

Anyway i got he ate one tiny cricket today (his sister is eating three medium size crickets already) but im afraid that not eating is not going to help him to get better.

Is there anything i can do to get him stronger ? i can feel hes quite weak now. Apart from the food, is there any other thing i can do , or just wait ?

im afraid hes not going to do it.

any answer is apreciated.

thanks

 

[mrblue]

these kinds of problems (missing/wonky bits afrter moulting) can only be fixed through successive moults. as long as he can catch and eat food then he should eventually make it to the next moult and get the chance to fix himself up a bit. as for making him stronger, i dont think theres anything you can do.

edit: some people choose to hand-feed weak mantids to get them through to the next moult but you say yours has already caught a little cricket, so as long as it is catching eating on its own he should be fine in the long run, though you may find he takes a little longer to reach the next moult then for example his healthier sister.

 

[londonmantid]

hi

to be honest , i think the cricket felt over him when i put three o four on his container, its not that he caught it

in fact when he finished eating the cricket was at the bottom of the container and if any of the other crickets passed by close to him looked frightened and finally he climbed on to the decoration plants to avoid the crickets forgetting the feeding thing, thats basically my concern about if hes going to try to feed by himself...lets see

thanks a lot for the answer

 

[mrblue]

i'm not quite sure what you mean but if he is eating at all on his own then thats a good sign. and if not, like i said there is always the option of hand-feeding (when you put a juicy bit of prey up to his mouth, he starts to eat and eventually should take over and grab the prey from you. i'm sure if you search the forum you can find other people's techniques/experiences/opinions about/with this). good luck!

 

[londonmantid]

sorry if i didnt explain it properly

i opened the lid of the container and drop some crickets inside, one of the crickets just felt right over him so he just reacted grabbing it and then started to eat it

im going to wait till tomorrow and if hes still not eating im going to try the manual feeding as you say

thanks again

 

[kamakiri]

If he got that one on his own, I wouldn't worry too much

And remember that the males don't eat as much as the females in the later instars...

 

[londonmantid]

hi again

ive tried today the manual feeding after leaving him chilling out for a while but hes absolutely scared about anything moving close to him

so i left him again inside the container and lets see

dont want to get too worried

maybe tomorrow ill try to get for him some fruit flies to see if those dont scare him as much as small crickets

 

[darkspeed]

What species?

 

[londonmantid]

C Gemmatus

 

[yen_saw]

HI londonmantis, my C. gemmatus is extremely nervous too, it is common. You can try to feed your C. gemmatus less crickets and more flies which is more suitable food for flower type mantis.

 

[londonmantid]

Thanks Yen

definitely im going to change his diet to fruit flies

i didnt do before because all the rest of gemmatus, elongatus and pictipennis ive got were feeding with no problem with crickets as theyre really tiny ones

But i guess that if i want to give a chance to this little man to do it i have to give to him a less active food

thanks a lot

 

[londonmantid]

Thanks Yen

definitely im going to change his diet to fruit flies

i didnt do before because all the rest of gemmatus, elongatus and pictipennis ive got were feeding with no problem with crickets as theyre really tiny ones

But i guess that if i want to give a chance to this little man to do it i have to give to him a less active food

thanks a lot