• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Mantis egg cases

William H.

Critical Thinker
W
Joined
Feb 26, 2002
Messages
467
Several weeks ago I bought three mantis egg cases at the local garden shop for about $6 (total), and two of them finally hatched the other day. As seen in the first photo, the egg cases are about the size of a walnut and contain up to 100 eggs each:

mantis1.jpg



I didn't get quite 100 hatchlings, probably closer to sixty, and a number of them got stuck trying to escape the egg case.
mantis2.jpg


I found a couple of photogenic ones that were good enough to cooperate with me and stay still for a few seconds, I hope these large photos aren't too slow to load:

mantis3.jpg



mantis5.jpg


Actual size of the baby mantis is 3/8" long.
mantis4.jpg


They've been released in the garden, hopefully I'll be able to find them in a few months when they've grown to 3-5 inches so I can take a few more photos.
 
Cool, but my experience growing up was that the Lady bugs we ordered always left to benefit someone else's garden. Do you find releasing Mantis (mantises, manti?) effective?
 
RandFan said:
Cool, but my experience growing up was that the Lady bugs we ordered always left to benefit someone else's garden. Do you find releasing Mantis (mantises, manti?) effective?
Click to expand...

Can't say right now if it's effective, I just released them this weekend. I'm guessing that just a small number of them will survive and some of them will leave our garden, but I'm not too concerned since I mostly got the egg cases to show the kids and take some photos. I'll have to see how many adults I can find in a couple of months.

Thanks to everyone for the positive comments.
 
Those little guys/gals are just too darned cute. Thanks for the pics! :D
 
William H. said:
Can't say right now if it's effective, I just released them this weekend. I'm guessing that just a small number of them will survive and some of them will leave our garden, but I'm not too concerned since I mostly got the egg cases to show the kids and take some photos. I'll have to see how many adults I can find in a couple of months.

Thanks to everyone for the positive comments.
Click to expand...
If you get the opportunity please do a follow up. Ain't science great? :) There is nothing better than introducing kids to the natural world.
 
This is so cool !! Nice photos.

I caught a tiny gecko (house lizard) the other day in office.
Told my children about it, but was not allow to bring home because my mrs would freakout.

Since you are on the topic of Mantis with your children,
the following info about Mantis shrimp might be of interest to you.

While human see 3 colors using 3 photoreceptor cones,
the mantis shrimps has 10 photoreceptor pigments.
The best vision in the world!

Can even smash the glass of an aquarium. (or the claws of a crab, before it eats the crab)

It learns from experience, and signal to each other using pigments on it's body.

http://www.umbc.edu/gradschool/research/profile_11.html

http://www.togar.de/English/aqua/mantis_shrimp.htm
 
Those mantis shrimp are amazing, it's hard to believe how strong something that small can be.
 
I remember these from when I was a kid. A friend found an egg case and accidentally left it at my house for a few days. My mother was a pretty good sport about having a hundred praying mantises in my room.

CBL
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom