It’s Goro’s (L8, F, Tenodera sinensis) turn to get the treat! This time it looks like it’s an adult katydid instead of a grasshopper! Nice! Motaro also got another cabbage butterfly caterpillar today, too, since I saw another one on my mustard plant.
A little while ago I kept seeing a Cabbage Butterfly fluttering around the potted plants and vegetables we have on the deck, and I said it’s probably laying eggs. Sure enough, I went to water and saw a bright green caterpillar wiggling around on my mustard plant! A perfect snack for Motaro (L8, F, Tenodera sinensis). ((Also pictured: the unfertilized ootheca he laid a while ago…))
I was curious so I had to look something up, and thought I’d share it here. It’s pretty common knowledge that many caterpillars are poisonous due to eating poisonous plants like milkweed - that’s why some are brightly coloured with stripes. This is a deterrent to predation by other species… except praying mantids. Mantids will instinctively eat the caterpillar, and then discard the innards that contain poisonous plant matter, so they minimize the amount of toxins they ingest. Even still, some toxins are still present and absorbed into the rest of the caterpillar’s body, but produce no adverse effects on a mantis. One study concluded that a varied diet (that included poisonous caterpillars) was ultimately more healthy for the mantises they studied. I don’t think cabbage butterfly caterpillars are necessarily poisonous, but I’ve definitely seen my babies discard the stomachs of their large prey when I watched them. Pretty cool to see how smart they actually are, as far as insect intelligence goes.
First pic is Goro (SUCH A CREEPY PIC OF HIM!!), the rest is all Motaro! Gotta love that completely alien mantis anatomy. ☠ Earlier I was using the flashlight to find something to give Motaro (so I won’t have to give up a Darkling yet), and got the idea to use the light to take some pics because my house has bad lighting, and all these pics I took are SO amazing and scary and dramatic, and perfect for Halloween.
I’m also gonna need y'all to pray for Motaro tonight because I found this giant ass grasshopper again and gave it to him since he just laid eggs and needs to eat something nutritive… but he’s so full already. Goro is also looking quite plump, so I couldn’t give it to him. I let Motaro eat as much as I felt safe giving him, but then I couldn’t wrestle the thing away without hurting him. I did rip off a hopper leg which I gave to Goro and he gladly took, and that helped ease the burden of size a bit, but the rest is going to all be in Motaro’s hands, literally. So if I wake up to a dead mantis tomorrow I’m gonna be so upset. Hopefully he drops it when he realizes he can’t fit more, but my body is collapsing on me rn and I can’t do this rn.
TW INSECT FEEDING PICS: CHINESE MANTIS VERSUS GIANT-ASS GRASSHOPPER!! CAN HE DO IT?!?!
I keep forgetting to share these pics from like 2 months ago… I found a HUGE grasshopper when hunting for mantis food, and decided to give Motaro (F, L8, Chinese Mantis) the chance to take it down. And he did. Instantly. Before the grasshopper could even jump out of the cup. Those huge, powerful grasshopper legs were no match for the deathgrip of an adult mantis. RIP cute buggie.
I also wanted to test how much of it Motaro would actually eat, since the grasshopper was BIGGER than Motaro. In the end, I had to actually pull away the last leg of the grasshopper because I could see that Motaro reached his limit, but was still going to try and stuff it in, and I didn’t want to see my baby burst. I did make sure to check on him all the next day, too, and here I am about 2 months later, and Motaro just laid an infertile ootheca, so I feel good about giving him this grasshopper, (and about taking the last leg away - meaning, I didn’t injure him by giving him this BIG opportunity.)
It is truly amazing what these animals can do, (and it’s fortunate for humanity that they are no bigger than our hands.) … Also, why is grasshopper blood dark blue?!
HOLY SHIT GUYS!! ( TW BUGS INSECTS EGG SACS ) So. This is Motaro. Motaro (F, L8, Chinese Mantis) has never met an adult male in his life. Motaro has been looking exceptionally bodacious over the past 2 weeks. And I’m so dumb. I really was out here thinking Motaro was pigging out on all the isopods in his tank, when it waS THE EGGS IN HIS ABDOMEN HE NEEDED TO LAY AND I FEEL CRUEL FOR NOT GIVING HIM BIGGER MEALS NOW WHEN HE COULD HAVE USED THE EXTRA ENERGY. I went to give him a snack, and saw some white stuff poking out of the lid and my heart dropped, I thought it was like death-vomit or something terrible, then I look closer and, no, it’s EGGS. EGGS FROM MY VIRGIN MANTIS. IT’S A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE. ((Also, a nightmare because I do not want to struggle with caring for delicate babies over winter.)) But I’m even dumber cuz, turns out, it’s quite common for female mantises to lay an ootheca, or even a few oothecae. Whether they found a mate or not, their body still makes the egg material, and they need to get rid of it somehow. Like menstruation, I guess. And as miraculous as I thought it might be, there’s like a 99.9% chance they won’t hatch anything (at least not that will survive past a day), since Chinese Mantises don’t need to survive through self-cloning/parthenogenesis. (PHEW!) Still, this was a huge surprise to find IN PROGRESS. But also a little heartbreaking because Motaro and Goro are definitely getting old. And I will miss them when they pass this winter. For now, I’m gonna assume they’re not eating the unpalatable isopods, and make the effort to get them full meals (and probably give Motaro one of the mealworms/now adult Darkling Beetles). I just now managed to find and catch an easy-to-eat caterpillar for him, so that’ll hold him over till morning when I can find more goodies.
I hatched these cute baby mantises in my studio over the summer, to release in my garden. It was such a pleasure to watch them get larger each week, as I came across them randomly lurking around my yard. . Shop TheButterflyBabe.com or via the link in my bio . #THEBUTTERFLYBABE #BUTTERFLY
