10/28/2025
So let’s talk about the Carolina mantid, one of Pennsylvania’s truly native preying mantis species.
The Carolina mantid is about 1/2 the length and width of the more commonly seen Chinese mantid.
It can be found in nearly 30 states and extends its range south to Brazil.
The males, which are smaller than females, have a brownish-tan body with green legs. The females are greyish-brown and mottled with white. When filled with eggs, the abdomen swells beyond the limits of her wings, making her appear to have very small wings.
Once we experience our first hard frost or cold temperatures, the mantid is pretty much done with their lives and the egg cases, known as oothecas, or ooths, overwinter and carry the lineage to the next year.
I rarely see Carolina mantids, but in the past week, between Mount Joy and Delta (PA) I have seen 5 specimens, one male that luckily survived sexual cannibalism, and four females.
Late October is a good time to collect them for insect collections. The males are done mating, and was the case with the one male I found, he passed within a day. One female I found was in rough shape, possibly due to a predator. She passed quickly too.
But here’s the fun part. Almost a week later, the surviving three females are still alive in separate terrariums. I’ve been feeding them spotted lanternflies with slim success. Either they don’t want them or they are not hungry.
I’m letting them live their remaining days inside where they definitely have a chance to survive a bit longer.
Because of this, I was witness to an extremely rare event, the type of event naturalists could spend a lifetime looking for: One of the females laying her ootheca.
She had already started by the time I noticed, but I was able to take a three-hour long time lapse video of the process as she completed and compressed it into a 20 second video clip. That is found below in the comments.
That ooth is now outside where it belongs and will be relocated soon to a more protected outdoor area.
Carolina mantids can lay multiple ooths, so as of now, I am simply waiting to see if the other females lay any additional ooths.
Below are various pictures of all the specimens. Most aren’t the best pictures, but I’ll post them regardless.
Enjoy! And as always, don’t hesitate to ask me any questions!
