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The Ghost Mantid ooth begins to hatch!

  • #21
How am I keeping my ooths you ask...

slighlty higher than room temps (mid to high 70's in the day, whatever it cools off to at night).

Humidity is pretty good - they'r in a jar with what amounts to a papertowel (really some sort of cloth) over the top - air permiable, but it does serve to keep the humidy up.

I mist the inside to the jar every couple of days (when it looks dry).

That's pretty much it.

This species seems to be very forgiving....On my first ooth, Ii don't think I ever misted it...and I still got 15 or 20 nymphs.

Just wait and see what your larger ooth delivers. It's funny, I noticed that these are relatively large L1 babies, compared to the size of the adults.

Thought I just had one of my Idolo's shed to L3 today, too....and man, it's HUGE (for an L3).
 
  • #22
Lost both my Spiny flowers today, one had the appearance/actions of a female but she didn't last any longer than him - perhaps neither sex of this species lives long but i never got any ooths from them either. :( One was dead in the fern this morning and the other dropped in front of me twitched a few times and that was it. They had really been slowing down in the past week so I knew it was nearing "that time", just so shocking to be ready to mist the tank and see "plop!"

But in that case, "Oh Yen....!" :D
 
  • #23
Sorry to hear about the spiny flowers. That stinks...but with bugs, it's part of the hobby. They just don't last that long.

But in that case, "Oh Yen....!"

LOL! No kidding. Have you tried Rebecca? She's good too....and it's easier to browse what she has in stock - it's posted on her site.
 
  • #24
I always incubated my ootheca in the 32oz cups you can get from Rebecca. I fold up a paper towel and put it in the bottom, make sure its plenty moist, then add a heat source underneath. I hatched many ootheca on top of a cup warmer - although, I had to add a buffer zone, since it was too hot to place the cup directly on it. The sides of the cup should look just a little foggy, but if there's droplets forming, or if the condensation looks heavy, its probably too wet. 80-85F is typically going to be the best temperature. Hatching ootheca is pretty straight-forward, it seems the less you fret about them the better off they are. I once had a shipment of a dozen wahlbergii ootheca arrive from Africa in the middle of winter in a thin paper envelope broken into pieces. I tossed them into a plastic cup, thinking them gone for, only to find nymphs running everywhere a few days later.

I'm finally getting back into mantids again after quite some time. Ten gongys and a pair of brunneriana should be at my doorstep in around two weeks. :D You can find me on MF under the username Andrew.
 
  • #25
I'm just disappointed I didn't get an ooth or two out of them.

Honestly, the only thing I can afford from Rebbecca is BB flies! LOL
 
  • #26
I always incubated my ootheca in the 32oz cups you can get from Rebecca. I fold up a paper towel and put it in the bottom, make sure its plenty moist, then add a heat source underneath. I hatched many ootheca on top of a cup warmer - although, I had to add a buffer zone, since it was too hot to place the cup directly on it. The sides of the cup should look just a little foggy, but if there's droplets forming, or if the condensation looks heavy, its probably too wet. 80-85F is typically going to be the best temperature. Hatching ootheca is pretty straight-forward, it seems the less you fret about them the better off they are. I once had a shipment of a dozen wahlbergii ootheca arrive from Africa in the middle of winter in a thin paper envelope broken into pieces. I tossed them into a plastic cup, thinking them gone for, only to find nymphs running everywhere a few days later.

I'm finally getting back into mantids again after quite some time. Ten gongys and a pair of brunneriana should be at my doorstep in around two weeks. :D You can find me on MF under the username Andrew.

So you also getting your violins from Yen. :)
 
  • #27
Yessir. I feel ridiculously lucky, I've been in the hobby for several years and have never been able to get my hands on any. Idolomantis was easier to get than those, lol. Nearly added some sibylla to the order, but, well...its got to stop somewhere, lol.
Yeah, Rebecca has needed to work on her pricing structure for quite some time. Not very competitive, don't know where she pulls those numbers from. @_@;
 
  • #28
I think Rebecca's prices may be built on the accessability of the information. You don't have to ASK her what she has, and how much...it's right there for you.

You pay a little extra for convenience!

With Yen, you get much better prices...but it's a bit of a scavenger hunt.

Both breeders turn out top-notch mantids!

If you can get stuff from Brian A, or Ismart, they have great stuff, too.

I have Acontista multicor, purple boxers (don't know the latin name) and ghosts from Brian A., and D. bolivari adult pair and H. multispina ooth from Ismart. Can't wait for the latter to hatch!
 
  • #29
Rebecca's prices are a bit high and I can't figure out if they prices are for nymphs or adults. Yen has good prices, sends good stuff. Brian A. I've have difficulty with. He's got great prices, but I'll avoid dealing with him due to past experience.
 
  • #30
Turns out I'm getting a bunch of little violins as well! The subadult female mismolted at the last moment D: .
My ghosts are getting big, fast. Female hit L5 the other day.... wow. She's almost blue! When they molt you really see the difference in size.
Yen's stuff is great, he gives 110% all the time. (well, he gave me 6 ghosts instead of 5, so I guess that's 120%.)
 
  • #31
Man, everybody's getting the bug...! We're gonna have to have the first annual TF mantid show (thread) pretty soon where we all show our critters and their enclosures
 
  • #32
Man, everybody's getting the bug...! We're gonna have to have the first annual TF mantid show (thread) pretty soon where we all show our critters and their enclosures

That's a fantastic idea!
 
  • #33
We'll have to wait til our Violins arrive! :D

I am incubating ooth #2 now, I have the same container with live moss in the bottom but I taped over the ventilation which got me the fog on the sides but I am afraid it will grow mold on the ooth if it stays that wet for a month before hatching so I pulled the tape off. I will have to experiment with how much to tape it off to get fog but not mold.
 
  • #34
I have no luck with ghost ooths. I got my first one from Poland, it didn't hatch, I cut it open and it was all black inside. So the guy sent 2 more, it's been a week, been keeping it warm and very humid, but nothing is hatching. I wonder it they're drying out during shipping, it takes 10 days to receive my packages from Poland.
 
  • #35
Larry - if they hatched in shipping, you would have had bodies everywhere.

My experience with ghost ooths is that they can take quite a while (couple of months) sometimes to hatch. If it's only been a week, you have PLENTY of time before you should worry.
 
  • #36
Guess I spoke too soon. My ghost ooth hatched yesterday, 1 died, 1 stuck and is probably dead and about 5 healthy looking ghosts. The hatch rate is a bit disappointing. Oh well, I have another ooth, hopefully that'll be more productive. I should be receiving a female today, I'll try to mate her tomorrow. I hope to be overrun by ghosts someday.
 
  • #37
What will you do with them all? My big fear is if I do get a good hatch on any of my critters and nobody wants them or already has them then what? Can't release them so they either have to be used as food for other things or try and find homes for them all cos I don't have space or even a desire to keep 50 ghosts or 40 horsehead grasshoppers or 100 baby crabs or 50 pygmy chameleons or... a few of each is all I want! LOL
 
  • #38
Ghosts are so awesome someone will want them. Plus, ghosts are communal so I want to have a large tank filled with them. So I actually have only 4 babies, very dissapointing.
 
  • #39
Ghosts are so awesome someone will want them.
Let's hope so!

My 4 baby ghosts from ooth #1 have now all molted into 1/4" - 1/2" tall true baby ghosts with the head casques. So far all are still brown, no greens despite a green mother.
Moved them up to the larger D. heydei fruit flies flies too. These little guys eat a lot of fruit flies over the course of a day, I wonder how many a fat little dart frog could eat everyday, geez!
 
  • #40
Swords, they can tackle the D heydei at L1....at L2 you can move to houseflies, if you have a source. Of course, they can continue on the FF's...they'll just eat more of them.

As nyphs, they are very aggressive towards their prey, and will actually stalk. Once they get a bit older, they almost completely rely on ambush predation (though if really hungry, will give "chase").

Larry is right, too, to a point - they are communal - which means only that they engage in LESS canibalism than other mantids. It can still happen, especially if you don't feed them enough. This is not normally an issue until later on, when there becomes a dispariy in how fast they mature (hense a significant size difference).

But with your numbers, one semi-large cage will be fine. Even a 32 oz containter until they're L4.

I raised 10 in a 2 1/2 gallon hex aquarium and had NO canibalism - but I was lucky.
 
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