Giant shield mantis log

(7-19-2007) First adult pair mated few days ago, it was a success. Yesterday, the same female appear to be acceptive again, so i
introduce another male and they promptly mated. Hopefully, i can find an ootheca soon in the cage! By the way, my last adult subadult
female has successfully moulted into adult! Now i have 4 male and 8 female all in adult stage.

(7-25-2007) Couple days ago, the female decided to lay an HUGE ootheca. Glad to know this has been smooth sailing for me and
hopefully the ooth will hatch out handsomely.

(8-5-2007) Out of the 8 female, i am pretty sure 6 have been mated and fertile. But it came with a huge price, 3 male casualty. I am
down to only 1 male. Even when fed to the extend that she rejected food, i still found half body of the male riding on the back of the
female. Obviously, while mating, female turn around and grabbed the male, and presumably finished off the head and prothorax of the
male. However, i have 4 oothecae form the females, all out them the first. So the next generation is looking good!! All oothecae have
been larger than what i have seen before from the wild collected female.

(8-15-2007) Finally all 8 female were mated. Actually, the last one is still connected to the male, if all 8 female are fertile, i will be
swarmed by loads of hatchling! I don't mind for some reason, just have to prepare loads of fruit flies cultures. The first ooth will
hopefully hatched by end of this month, all the oothecae i have so far appear to potentially produce 200 nymphs!!

(9-7-2007) August come and go, it is into first week of September now, the mated female are still laying ootheca but the first ooth is yet
to hatch. I am getting worry, finger cross it will still hatch, i will give it another 2 weeks before making the decision for a "destructive test"!

(9-15-2007) One of the oothecae hatched finally!! what a wait on this species, it certainly worth the wait. After all the hardwork on this
species, it will be hard to swallow if it fail to generate a new generation. About 350 nymphs hatched!! Casualty is there but minimal
fortunately, they are as usual feeding like mad even at L1. I almost forgot how small they are when hatched, but they sure have a huge
appetite!!

(9-18-2007) The first moult was being witnessed as i checked the idolomantis cage, really glad to have this species bred for the first
generation. I am re-mating some females here to increase fertility. The casualty rate increase significantly but i still have about 200
nymphs left.

(10-14-2007) Another ooth hatched out in hundreds, other ootheca hatched only few, it is very unreliable on some ooth but another
ooth hatched out just fine? I am going to just sell them off and not keeping another generation.

(10-21-2007) Another 3 ooth hatched out in hundreds, I am again out of fruit flies, well at least i expect them to be depleted in as little
as 3 days. My supply from Chuck is still in transit. ANyway, i am starting to sell off few oothecae, bet fruit flies are pleased to hear that!

(10-24-2007) Another ooth hatched out in hundreds, but i received the fruit fly pupa from Chuck, yep Chuck to the rescue again! THe
last 4 oothecae been pretty accurate in hatching time. All hatched in 30 days. I lost one adult female from unknown sickness, as she
only produced 4 oothecae, other adult female is on the 6th ooth.

(10-28-2007) One more ooth hatched out, about 200 nymphs, i decided to get rid of anyootheca in the future to avoid caring for more of
them. I will probably keep the next 1-2 ooth to hatch, and that is it!!

(11-04-2007)
Another ooth just hatched today, i have so many now i am keeping bunch of them together and let the cannibalism take care of the
number. It is crazy!!

(11-13-2007)
Two of the female couldn't make it recently, i think they are sick because each of them only lay 4 ooth. My guess is the crickets could be
the culprit. I am being more careful now when feeding crickets to shield mantis.

(11-18-2007)
The nymphs are growing now as i fed them lot of flight capable fruit flies and plenty of heat. But cannibalism kicked in too but with
hundreds of nymphs i will still be hand full even with 50% casualty. Anyway, i am dropping this species to concentrate on other new
species.

(11-25-2007)
My mated female is still alive and couple are on their 7th ooth. That means the other female that die after laying their 4th ooth are
probably not dying due to old age, but of sickness. My first guess is food. I have bought some roaches to increase variety of food supply
in this cold winter.

(12-02-2007)
I am still offloading my shield mantis nymphs around the world, they are pretty popular in the Europe apparently, but not as marketable
here in the USA. However, i still have people asking for it once a while. One of my adult female produced a huge ooth, it was her 5th
ooth but it appear to be as large as the first ootheca produced by most of the female.

(12-16-2007)
I am down to the last three females, after close to 6 months as adult, female show sign of "tear and wear" with broken legs especially
on the tarsus and faded wing color. After the 6th or 7th ooth, i wonder if they are go on for another ooth. I have to say goodbye to this
species for now, even though i am still waiting for their actual species name.

(12-24-2007)
Finally all my females perished after 6 months as adult. Each produced 4 to 7 oothecae. I am dropping out this species now to
concentrate on other species. It is a shame that the actual species name remain unknown, but i am sure i will revisit Rhombodera
species again, if not this species. Following is the classic pic of my adult female devouring a mismoulted idolomantis.