Can i feed my preying mantis by flies?

Question

i found a mantis in our garden.does it eat flies?

Answer 1

Depending on how large your preying mantis is it may be able to eat flies. However, mantises do not make great pets, and if you leave the mantis outside your garden you will be able to rest knowing that is happily feeding on the proper insects outside in nature.

Answer 2

Mantises are notable for their hunting abilities. They are exclusively predatory, and their diet usually consists of living insects, including flies and aphids; larger species have been known to prey on small lizards, frogs, hummingbirds,baby birds, snakes, and even rodents. Most mantises are ambush predators, waiting for prey to stray too near. The mantis then lashes out at remarkable speed. Some ground and bark species, however, pursue their prey rather quickly.

Picture of a Mantid eating a hummingbird.

http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x236/...

picture of a mantid eating a bumble bee.

http://bugguide.net/node/view/7365

Picture of a mantid eating a fly

http://www.dkimages.com/discover/DKIMAGE...

Answer 3

I'm not an expert on praying mantises, but I would reccommend that if you found it in the wild, you put it back there.  Wild animals do not make suitable pets, and often find captivity very distressing.

If you don't plan on releasing it though, try to mimic its natural diet.  I don't know what part of the world you're from, so I'm not sure what would be available, but mantis naturally have a varied diet, including: other mantises, beetles, butterflies, spiders, crickets, grasshoppers, small frogs, small lizards, mice and small hummingbirds and young birds.  I don't think flies are part of their natural diet.  They are also active predators rather than carrion feeders so it would be preferable to give it live food.

Tame praying mantids do eat fruit flies, smaller mantids, moths, crickets and mealworms.  Its important to feed a vitamin enriched food to the prey in order to ensure that the mantis gets its vitamin requirements.

I think I should also point out that it is illegal to keep a praying mantis as a pet in many countries/states, so check your local laws.

Answer 4

yes of course but not obligatory