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Kongobatha Diademata (Snake Mantis)

  • Writer: Pocket Kaiju
    Pocket Kaiju
  • Feb 15
  • 2 min read

Updated: May 4

K. diademata is a small species of mantis inhabiting eastern coast of Australia. Adults grow up to be 3cm in lenght and are capable of flight. They’re usually green with red horizontal stripe through their eyes, jaguar spots on their raptorials and pink mandibles but can also be found in pastel blue or yellow coloration. They like to press their body against leaves to camouflage, behaviour that they also display in captivity, flattening against their enclosure when they don’t want to be picked up.
K. diademata is a small species of mantis inhabiting eastern coast of Australia. Adults grow up to be 3cm in lenght and are capable of flight. They’re usually green with red horizontal stripe through their eyes, jaguar spots on their raptorials and pink mandibles but can also be found in pastel blue or yellow coloration. They like to press their body against leaves to camouflage, behaviour that they also display in captivity, flattening against their enclosure when they don’t want to be picked up.

Housing: Keep your nymph(baby) in a small, well ventilated container. Minimum 6cm tall cup with fine mesh/tulle on top works well. Once they reach subadulthood(they have big, visible wing buds), move them to a bigger enclosure, the new container should be at least 9cm tall with good ventilation. You can use coco soil or paper towels as substrate and add a fake plant or small branch for the mantis to climb on. Young ones will spend most of their time hanging upside down from the top mesh or leaves.


Temperature/Humidity: They do great in house temperature. It’s best to keep them between 20 to 30 degrees but they should be fine for short periods of time in slightly colder conditions. Humidity between 50-70% will be good for them but they need regular access to drinking water droplets.


Water/Food: Since hatching from ootheca, until subadulthood they can eat flightless fruit flies as their sole food source. Drop around 4 fruit flies into their enclosure every third day, or just keep adding a new fly every day if you see the previous ones disappeared. Nymphs can eat every day. Adult mantises will enjoy a house fly, or two, every third day. Spray nymph’s enclosure with pure water(rain, spring or bottled) through the mesh twice a day to give them a chance to drink. Adults can be sprayed once a day.


Handling: You need to take special care when handling this species. The nymphs are tiny, fast and very jumpy. You can hold them, but you need to keep your eyes on the mantis at all times, so it doesn’t suddenly disappear. Once they get used to you, they become less flighty and will happily climb on your finger and do the mantis dance. Adults of both sexes can, and will, fly. Make sure there is no open windows when taking them out and be ready to collect them gently from the ceiling. They’re friendly and curious. Usually you won’t need to chase them to get them back, just gently push your finger under your mantis to make it climb on you.


IMPORTANT

These mantises are captive-bred and should NOT be released into the wild. If you have any issues, please contact info.pocketkaiju@gmail.com


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