Orchid mantis - Hymenopus Coronatus L2-3 Nymphs - Butterfly Plants
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The famous orchid mantis, with its beautiful camouflage and even the ability to change colour from white to pink over a couple days its easy to see why it's everyone's favourite mantis.
Originating from the rain forests of Malaysia through to Indonesia the orchid mantis evolved to be an ambush hunter, waiting on flowers for flies, butterflies and moths to visit the flower before quickly snatching them out the air. This lifestyle led to their extraordinary ability to change colour to better help them camouflage against their chosen flower, you can see this for yourself if you put a pink or white flower in their enclosure they will change to match it over a couple days.
Care requirements:
- Temperature: 18-28 degrees. A warm room is typically alright for these mantis but the warmer you keep them the faster they grow
- Humidity: 60%-80%
- Food: Currently feeding on live fruit flies, but will take blue bottles and smaller moths as they get bigger. Be careful not to feed orchid mantis crickets, as the gut bacteria in them is harmful to the mantis.
- Size: 3-7cm (Females grow to be about 4 times the size of an adult male).
- Lifespan: 9-20 months (males only live for 9 months but females can go on for over a year as an adult).
- Enclosure: As a minimum they need an enclosure that's three times their own height and twice the length of themselves. So for an adult female the minimum I would recommend is a 15cm by 15cm by 20cm tall enclosure.
- Breeding: This is a slightly more challenging mantis to breed. Once the female molts into adulthood allow her to mature for about 4 weeks before trying to introduce the male. The male should hopefully spot her and creep up behind her. Keep an eye on them at this stage and intervene if the female is overly interested in the male. Mating normally lasts for 2-8 hours but can go on for over 3 days. Keep the female well fed and she should lay her first ootheca shortly after mating. The ootheca will hatch about 3-4 weeks after being laid and can contain between 10-60 nymphs. Young nymphs are cannibalistic and should be separated a few days after hatching.
























