Will a praying mantis eat asian ladybugs?

[Tman]

This time of year in Minnesota the invasive species of asian ladybugs start getting into the house. They bite by the way, and can draw blood. I am wondering if a praying mantis would eat one of these. I know that they are such a pest and so numerous because they taste bad so nothing preys on them. If you smoosh one they smell bad as well as leave a stain.

I just don't want to go through the trouble of catching one to try to have it not get eaten and then have it maybe bugging the mantis. If it can make me bleed maybe it could cause issues if left for a while.

If anyone has experience with this I would be happy to hear your advice. Right now sitting in my living room I can see about 10 of the darn things. Would be nice to feed the terrible buggers to "my little pet (insert evil laugh here)" lol.

 

[Rick]

Just try and see. They know what they can and cannnot eat. If the mantis won't eat it they will drop it.

Please see the introductions forum to make your intro to the group. Thanks.

 

[LauraMG]

Just try and see. They know what they can and cannnot eat. If the mantis won't eat it they will drop it.

+1!

 

[Tman]

I have one in there right now but it doesn't seem to be hungry. I caught it at work on sunday and fed it a medium cricket sunday night which it ate in less than 5 minutes with no leftovers lol. I read that you only need to feed it a couple crickets every other or every third day. Does that sound right?

 

[PeterF]

I have 3 European mantids each with 2 lady bugs in jars.

I use the jars for premating feeding, they stay closer to the food and find it better.

It doesn't look like they are going to eat them. The lady bugs move most of the time, and sometimes the mantids watch them intensely. But if they've tried them I haven't seen.

It's 2 males and 1 female. I didn't expect the female to bother with anything so small after such a long period of grasshoppers and fat adult crickets. But the Lbugs seemed a good size for the males.

 

[PhilinYuma]

Just try and see. They know what they can and cannnot eat. If the mantis won't eat it they will drop it.

Please see the introductions forum to make your intro to the group. Thanks.

+2! Though in this case, I think that the mantids will avoid the ladybird, probably tipped off by the smell.

 

[PhilinYuma]

Just try and see. They know what they can and cannnot eat. If the mantis won't eat it they will drop it.

Please see the introductions forum to make your intro to the group. Thanks.

+2! Though in this case, I think that the mantids will avoid the ladybird, probably tipped off by the smell.

 

[PeterF]

As an update. 5 of the 6 Convergent LadyBugs I handed out got eaten. All that was left was the wings (and the one whole live one of course).

I only witnessed one actual mantid eating a ladybug situation though.

And it was a much longer time between giving the food and eating that I would expect with Ghoppers or crickets.

If it matters to anyone, it was the female that only ate one. Though, she did eat all of it.