FlytrapCare Carnivorous Plant Forums

No contest, VFT all day. Now it was a baby mantis, but still. Part of me is a little sad because I do love these insects, but that's nature.

Yeah, that is a bit sad because I love praying mantis too, but sad things happen all the time in nature. At least your flytrap benefits from it

Exactly, plus there is something to be said for a carnivorous plant eating a carnivorous insect.

On a side note, I once let a weed grow wild in my back yard because an adult mantis had taken residence on it. It was actually several weeks before she went away, the weed was at least 6 feet by then.

I put out mantis egg casings every spring and they normally hatch sometime durring the summer when it's the hottest.
Only about 30 to 40% of the eggs hatch and the others are duds!! I have to hide the casings from birds who will eat the tiny babies.

The babies who are luck enough to escape preditors (only a small fraction) grow up and tend to hang around the area, so I see
lots of these in my yard, and I have absolutly NO aphids (not a one) on any of my plants.

They are really hard to see, you have to look really hard. Sometimes I will see them on the outside of the house, and they do
get quite large.

I have always loved mantis, and the fact that they are natures "pest control" is just another reason to want them around

Most of the egg casings sold on the internet are no good, so I buy them from a local farmer who harvests them in the winter.

I'm sure some of the little ones are bound to get caught in my FT's, which I hate, but like you guys say, that's nature, I just hope
I dont actually see it!!