Giant Shield mantis - Rhombodera sp.

Anyone here following my website probably found out i have traded two ootheca of Rhombodera sp. recently. Well, one of it hatched the next day! But only 4 nymphs hatched out, when i was separating them this evening, one more hatched out. I really hope to raise them to adulthood but it will be tough. Hopefully I can spread this species eventually.

Ootheca (The top two are Rhombodera sp. bottom two are D. Desiccata)



Hatching



L1



This is the adult female which produced the ooth



edit: Taking R. Basilis out till further identification.

Oh I feel happy again !

I have not seen this species since '95 (whoops, '05 ) when I ended up with 6 females and no males

I really hope this is successful for you Yen.

How big is the mantis? Or how big is the lid that it's standing on?

Without answering for Yen....... females are typically 80-90mm.

Ah. That's not a bad size.

You mean 05 Rob.

Good luck Yen, if you need some advice, Rob is te guy to ask; he was the only person that managed to culture them in long term.

Have always been interested in these. Hopefully you can get them going.

Ok, apparently, it is still hatching, and this morning i woke up to find 40 more nymphs!! It is looking good for now at least, hope to raise them to another generation. I will get the pic later, lets hope the next ootheca will hatch out a good number too.

Hi.

We had Rh. basalis until 2005 or so. The old stock was bluish green. This one resembles the Rh. valida I had for a while, execpt that the shield is somewaht smaller in the specimen on the foto. Rh. valida was even larger that the Rh. basalis which were in stock. There are several variable species which look similarly and are hard to distinguish. I cannot say from the photo to which one it belongs.

Regards,

Christian

Awesome Yen

Nice to see these back in culture again. Was the female a WC, or CB specimen?

congragulation Yen

Way to go!

Luke

Thanks guys. My intention is to breed them here first in the US, and hopefully they can continue for many generation. I just don't want to take any risk shipping it overseas again!!

Was the female a WC, or CB specimen?

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Female was a WC specimen.

Put me on the waiting list....

Put me on the waiting list....

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Ditto!

Here are more pics of the hatchling, i have no idea they hatched out over 2 days, or might be more...

if you need some advice, Rob is te guy to ask; he was the only person that managed to culture them in long term.

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Rob, could you kindly give a few pointers on what should i watch out for this species? What happened to your culture that left you with only 6 of this species after three generation?

Here is some simple advice Yen; avoid cold snaps. These will die so easily if the temperature drops suddenly (how i lost 4 sub adults in a night).

Anyway, good luck with them. If you want some more in-detail accounts, just msn me.

Rob, could you kindly give a few pointers on what should i watch out for this species? What happened to your culture that left you with only 6 of this species after three generation?

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At last I am able to reply !

It has taken me some time to remember what happened, my memory is fading :wink:

Basically at the beginning of 2005 (not '95 :wink: ) I lost 70+ 3rd-4th instar nymphs, the reason for this I will warn you about later. Then I moved house. I lost a few more through bad moults and some random deaths.

The next thing I knew I had 6 adult females and no males. I managed to get a male from Martin French and got my last female paired, this was after 6 months of watching them die one by one.

Unfortunatley she died before laying. And that was the last time I saw them. I feel emotional now

The best advice I can give you Yen is this; don't let the temperature drop below 70 F at night, this is how I lost the 70.

To be honest, I didn't find them anymore difficult to rear than Sphodromantis spp., though they will drink if you offer them water every 3 days.

Temperature during the day 80-85 F.

Do not try to keep them communially, it won't work :wink:

Though this may not be R. basalis (different colour), I think that you can assume they require similar conditions.

I hope that helps, Rob.

Thanks Sheldon. I assumed the low temp must be pretty low (<15C). Here is what i can share from the moment (Thanks Christian!), and some info for anyone else interested in this species in the future.

They are good feeders, and can be kept together at first stages, gut have to be spread out among large enclosures or kept separately at all as soon as they begin to show more interest to themselves as to the offered food... The T is critical: Rh. basalis did not well above 25-26°C, Rh. valida not over 28°C. By night, they needed 15-19° and 20°C, respectively. If it got hotter, they began vomiting and either died or became infertile as adults. I lost by valida stock to the hot summer last year. I couldn't cool them down. Something similar happened to the basalis. If your stock is from the lowlands, the T may not play such a critical note, but our stocks reacted badly on overheating.

Feeding is not really a problem. We do not feed crickets over here though, due to the vomiting desease.

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So far the appeared to be hardy being kept at 85F (day) and 80F (night) with daily misting. Zero casualty. Some have started to feed ferociously, eventhough they are just 6-10 hours after birth. Some even showing sign of "killing and not eating" habit, very disturbing. So anyone keeping nymph must have ample supply of food source. A total fruit fly massacre in the cage :shock: It wouldn't be too long before they turn into each other. Another observation was ootheca continue to hatch for the third day, another 30 nymphs found in the cage after i removed all out just yesterday. Will keep everyone update when possible. Hopefully more experience breeders can share their thought here as this is the species i hope to dsitribute in the future and experience from previous breeders are important to make this happen.

Thanks Rob, i didn't see your reply when i submit the previous post. Good info! As Summer is approaching, low temp will not be an issue here. I am more worry about temp. being too high based on Christian's advice.

That was a bummer about your 6 unmated female

Thanks again for the info.