Seasons in Southern California

[Paradoxica]

First a little back story; I find it much more reliable to have mantids shipped to the Preschool that I do classroom support at. So last week I had a couple Stalli's shipped to me there, I showed them to the kids and they LOVED them. This got me thinking that it would be interesting and fun to release an ooth of Religiosa's in our garden and sideyard.

I know that this is about the time of year that most of the wild mantids start to die off. Do I need to wait or will the nymphs be ok in the mild SoCal weather? I would really like to do this soon while they are still so excited about mantises.

Also how would you compare the temperament of a wild European mantis to that of the Chinese mantis?

 

[Ntsees]

I do not think the nymphs will survive if you were to release them at this time (it's getting cold and prey will not be abundant). As for temperament on Europeans and Chinese, I'll let those who've kept them both fill in on that. To make it more interesting, why not raise/release limbata or californica. They are native to southern California. It would be educational and a good idea to teach kids to value native species.

 

[Paradoxica]

I was thinking about Limbata's too, I have a female but I'm still waiting on a male but that would definitely be my preference.

 

[sinensispsyched]

Chinese are IMO calmer, since I had a religiosa female who'd do nothing but threat pose me. The chinese I had was much calmer.

 

[MantidLord]

Chinese would probably be best. They are more calm, and their larger size may win the hearts of the little kids. I've gotten clawed and latched (rightfully so) by many Euros after picking them up. But I've never gotten attacked or drew a threat pose from Chinese. Now, that's not saying they won't defend themselves, but I haven't experienced it yet. They seem more tolerant.