What are the BIGGEST reasons why they MUST eat flying insects?

[kitkat39]

I was reading around and was just wondering why some species MUST eat flying insects. I think the biggest reason I've seen so far is that females won't be able to produce their ootheca. If that's the case, would it be possible to feed the males other things such as roaches, mealworms, crickets, etc.? How about as nymphs growing up?

Has anyone here PERSONALLY noticed any bad effects from feeding your mantises that were supposed to eat only flying insects other types of food? I prefer answers from PERSONAL experienced as opposed to regurgitated information.

 

[PhilinYuma]

I was reading around and was just wondering why some species MUST eat flying insects. I think the biggest reason I've seen so far is that females won't be able to produce their ootheca. If that's the case, would it be possible to feed the males other things such as roaches, mealworms and crickets? How about as nymphs growing up?

Has anyone here PERSONALLY noticed any bad effects from feeding your mantises that were supposed to eat only flying insects other types of food? I prefer answers from people who have PERSONALLY experienced things as opposed to regurgitated information here.

Ah, there's yr problem, kitkat. Unquantified personal observation has given us ghosts, the Yeti and Chupacabra, and lots of Tartars saw the Nymph of Tchernaya (Lamia) during the Crimean War. People have seen (or almost!) mantids burst from overeating.

What you need to do to prove the point is to to raise two identical colonies of the test species one fed only with flying insects and the other with non flying critters like crix and roaches, and then repeat the experiment ad. lib, and maybe feed one colony on a mixture of both. Many roaches and orthopterans of one sex or both, fly at some time during their careers, and I have heard neither of mantids with different requirements for oogenesis nor insects with different --what, proteins, "essential vitamins"? -- that favor one type of mantid over another.

The fact is that flies are the preferred food for ambush predators that live higher than non flying insects tend to reach or who sit quietly until both they and the predator die of starvation. A fertile mantis needs a lot of protein to support the development of her eggs and the store of protein needed to for the ootheca. A pregnant female that is snagging enough non-flying food to stay alive may not be getting enough to form a batch of eggs. Feed mainly flying insects to ambush predators, and save yourself a lot of work and disappointment..

 

[Rick]

Its probably not for that reason, but instead because that is what they have adapted to be able to catch. Or, flying insects are what they come across most often in their native habitats. That is what I believe.

 

[kitkat39]

Ah, there's yr problem, kitkat. Unquantified personal observation has given us ghosts, the Yeti and Chupacabra, and lots of Tartars saw the Nymph of Tchernaya (Lamia) during the Crimean War. People have seen (or almost!) mantids burst from overeating.

What you need to do to prove the point is to to raise two identical colonies of the test species one fed only with flying insects and the other with non flying critters like crix and roaches, and then repeat the experiment ad. lib, and maybe feed one colony on a mixture of both. Many roaches and orthopterans of one sex or both, fly at some time during their careers, and I have heard neither of mantids with different requirements for oogenesis nor insects with different --what, proteins, "essential vitamins"? -- that favor one type of mantid over another.

The fact is that flies are the preferred food for ambush predators that live higher than non flying insects tend to reach or who sit quietly until both they and the predator die of starvation. A fertile mantis needs a lot of protein to support the development of her eggs and the store of protein needed to for the ootheca. A pregnant female that is snagging enough non-flying food to stay alive may not be getting enough to form a batch of eggs. Feed mainly flying insects to ambush predators, and save yourself a lot of work and disappointment..

Well Phil... You bring up some very good points, however, the point of bringing up this question in a thread like this is so I don't have to put in all the work to test out these theories and instead, find out from others who have possibly been through it already. Perhaps I may try out the experiment ideas if I do not get enough answers in this thread or I may just abandon it all together and just go with flying insects like most have been recommending. You bring up a good point with a fertile female needing a lot of protein to support the development of her eggs and ootheca, yet I've read that certain species of mantis can not properly produce ootheca because of too much proteins in their food. The main species that comes to mind here is the Violin Mantis. I am curious as to why I have heard so many people say that it is extremely bad to feed it a cricket or a roach or anything else, and that it MUST eat flies. I'm curious to see why it has to be a fly. Why can't it be a grasshopper/locust, beetle, grub, caterpillar, or even a walking stick? Perhaps it is the food that the prey item is putting into itself that matters? I'm hearing about people putting on extra pollen onto their flies and saying that it makes a possible difference.

The net is filled with a lot of great information.. and a lot of not so great information-The reason why I ask for personal experiences.

 

[hibiscusmile]

I am careful, but dissagree on what food they can have. If I was sitting on a branch or tall grass and sometime crawled or flew by me, I certainly would catch and eat it, so I am sure they do to. To think they only have flying food is silly, why in the desert, I understand there are a lot of crawling things, well maybe not a lot, but u get the picture, and thats what they adapt to eating, but surely if a butterfly or moth, just happens to lose their gps unit and end up in the desert, I think they would get eaten too:lol:

 

[sjb123]

i know that one of the reasons that orchid mantis cant have non flying insects is because they are adapted to living on orchids which grow high on trees where only flying insects will really go to pollinate then... BANG!!!! :hammer: :angel: lol bye bee

 

[sjb123]

but i guess that in the wild you get the odd ground insect climb a tree?

 

[4upakabra]

I completely gave up cricket for their mantids. Some species feed only with flies.

 

[Mex_Ghost]

The first time I tried to give a cricket to a Paradoxa (about L5) She didn´t wanted to eat it ( it was winter and there were no flies to catch), and a Friend told me "When She is really hungry She will eat it", and It happened, after that She ate crickets all of his life, and put several fertil ooths.

This friend also feeds his mantids with roaches, crickets, grasshoppers, flies, bees, and he is well known here in Mex as a breeder.

My first Orchids from mantisplace ate everything flies, wax, crickets, tenebrios, but I had no male in that time, now I have some others from mantisplace and from Polk, one don´t eat crikets by now, and about fertil ooths I think I´m going to find out. So I think even they are the same genus, they are diferent, they have their own personality.

and to Phil Chupacabras does exist :lol: :lol:

saludos

 

[guapoalto049]

I have not had experience with oogenesis with any exotics (just started with them). None of my US native mantids ever had problems when fed almost exclusively over the winter on crickets.

I've fed my violins crickets many times. They were on the thin side due to me slacking on catching flies that day. The crickets were wild caught though, straight from my yard. I believe cultured crickets could pose more problems with parasites and disease. The mantids didn't want to pick the crickets off the netting...I had to tweezer feed them as if it was flying prey.

My Phyllocrania eat a mixed diet of crickets and flies and they are all large and healthy.

I believe crickets are healthy, but in culture they are kept in poor conditions. Crickets require much more care than flies, which is why I try and stick to the smaller fly loving species in the winter when I can't get wc food. If a healthy reproducing culture is established, crickets should be good food.

 

[shorty]

Its probably not for that reason, but instead because that is what they have adapted to be able to catch. Or, flying insects are what they come across most often in their native habitats. That is what I believe.

I agree. I also think that it's simply because of what they've been adapted to be able to catch and eat. That being said, I don't see why they wouldn't be able to eat an insect that doesn't fly. How much physiological difference could there be?

 

[kitkat39]

So I think even they are the same genus, they are diferent, they have their own personality.

I think this is completely true since some of my mantis of the exact same species will eat certain things like pigs, while others don't even want to touch it.

What I am curious to know is if it is really bad for them to eat and could potentially harm them somehow in the future.

Sugar, Salt, Meat, Fat, Alcohol, Caffeine, Dairy, and everything else that makes life more enjoyable is BAD for us humans, yet we do it anyway. Sure we have diseases and side effects later on down the line in our lives, but for a mantis that only lives less than a year.. I really don't think it's that bad of a problem if it can still reproduce and continue on the generations. We are INBREEDING them like crazy, which should be BAD as well and no one seems to have a problem with that.. so I was just wondering why it's been so looked down on to feed certain species things other than flies.

Just seeing if people have actually had major problems with this. Mantis keeping has really only been around for a very short period of time. What others before us have done and written in the care sheets is not written in stone in my opinion. They may have experienced certain things and thought that it was a 100% ends of all truth when more could be added on. If we just stop with what a single group of people say and do not question or test it, then cigarettes may still be good for your health, slavery may still continue, Radiation and heroin can still be taken as over the counter drugs, and the "Perfect Race" should be blond hair-blue eyed, white skinned only that are allowed to exist.

Anyways, back to our original discussion of flying insects...

 

[PeterF]

I think this is completely true since some of my mantis of the exact same species will eat certain things like pigs, while others don't even want to touch it....

Anyways, back to our original discussion of flying insects...

Whoa! Please post pictures of your giant mantid eating a pig!

[/wink]

 

[eur0pein]

it is easier for them to ketch food