Anyway - I'm back with BUGS! We have been very interested in moths lately. We found a really cool one this morning -

Isn't it neat?! It's "FLUFFY"!

The reason we've been collecting moths is because last week Hunter found a Preying Mantis! It is the neatest bug I think I've ever seen!

This thing is Huge! Here is Chase holding it.

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Sept 28, 2003

What's better than 1 preying mantis? Well, TWO of course.

Hunter has found another mantis. Do you know how hard it is to catch enough bugs for both of them to eat in the fall?!

Here's Chase hand-feeding his cuddly pet!

Good thing this picture is rather blurry since the mantis has it head buried the body of a live moth!

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Latest Mantis Update:
We had 3 mantises until the other day....We had figured out that we had 2 males and 1 female. So I told the boys if we put one of the males in with the female, we might get babies! BUT - female preying mantis's have a rather nasty tendency to eat the males head after mating! So we were prepared.........

The male lasted about 24 hours in the cage with the female, then when I got home from work last night the kids reported that the female and eaten the males head and 'sucked his insides out!' just as predicted. Then they were saying something about the legs still moving without the head, I just kinda tuned them out at that point.

Later I was looking in the cage for the 'remains' and couldn't find them. I asked the kids about it and they had the 'body' laying on the coffee table. I went over and picked up the body by one of the legs and this headless thing started crawling on my hand !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I mean, it's one thing to let a live mantis (with a head) to crawl on you. I can handle that. But this headless body, YECH!  So of course I screamed and threw it on the floor and my dear, sweet boys - my protectors............................

 Well, they laughed so hard they about pee'd their pants! Hunter even choked on his spit. ha-ha.....real funny....so glad I could amuse them......that's what mom's are for...  (this is the mantra I chant in my head over and over lately!)

Here's what's left. And it's STILL moving today!!!! The head should be at the mid-left of the picture.

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Ok, more mantis news for those of you who are still interested.

Earlier in the week as I was busy making beads, suddenly I got a whiff of something NASTY! I look down and here is Max at my side, stinking to high heaven.

He had been in the house, so I couldn't imagine what he had gotten into, but he was SO BAD I had to put him directly in the sink and give him a bath!

So after his bath, I am wondering through the house trying to figure out what the heck he had rolled in.....Well, remember those 2 male mantises - you know, the ones who lost their heads (somehow?) after mating? Well, the boys had left one of them laying on the coffee table and little Max had decided this thing smelled pretty good - Heck, let's just roll around in it for awhile! There were stinking mantis parts all over the new carpet.

I mean this thing smelled so bad we had to get the shop vac from the garage to suck it up! Then I had to clean the carpet with enzymes so it would quit smelling!

So that's the latest on the Mantis front - here is a cool picture -

Our pregnant mantis - Oh, she be LOW in the water!

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Mantis tales continued...

Now instead of hanging from the top of the cage, she is hanging from wooden branches in the cage. I would have bet money she was going to lay eggs yesterday, I could see her abdomen moving (kinda like labor?) and she kept touching the branches with - well, you know-where the eggs would come out of.

LATE BREAKING NEWS

Right after I took this picture and uploaded it, she started laying eggs! They are foamy, frothy things and she's been at it for a couple hours now! See below:

I tell you - she's not looking too good. She had her pinchers all splayed apart and is just hanging there. Her body is about 1/2 the size as it was this morning, and it's STILL spewing foam, I mean eggs....