You probably don't remember me but I bought 3 egg sacs from you the third week of January. You sent them to me real fast. I believe you said they wouldn't hatch for about a month but they hatched in 6 days, 9 days, and about 11 days. The first batch kind of ate the second batch because I didn't have anything to feed them but then I got onto the net and found a great place that sells wingless fruit flies real cheap. As you said you do this a lot, you might try 1-877-FLY-MEAT. They charge only $10 for whopper cultures and their shipping and handling on 4 cultures the size of mason jars is under $10. Anyway, we flooded the terrarium with thousands of fruit flies and there was a little fruit fly Auschwitz. One son was aghast and didn't say much, the other said he felt bad for the fruit flies, and the other said "Cool". Three boys and all from the same family. The Cub Scouts came over to watch mesmerized as did my three and their comments were rather mixed also. To date we have about 75 alive in that 30 gallon long terrarium (converted fish tank). It is outfit like an insect palace with fresh plants and heat lamps to keep them toasty at 80 degrees and a sea sponge for them to drink from so they don't drown. We keep fresh fruit in there for the fruit flies so they stay where they belong and we put bottle tops of sweet root beer and other syrupy liquids to keep them in there too. The Cub Scouts come over about once a week and they use a spray bottle to mist the tank to keep the humidity high. Now that we got in the habit of flooding the tank with tasty tidbits every two days, they don't eat each other any more. Most of them are over an inch long and most of them are already turning the palest of greens. They have the cutest (for a bug that is) little heart shaped heads and they hold their front legs in front of them while they sway to and fro. Many of them have shed their outer whatevers a few times. It's rather interesting. We have six indoor only cats who have all just discovered there is something in there big enough for them to see now and our fat cat, Melvin, perches on top of the terrarium. This is perfectly fine as Melvin is well endowed (20.5 lbs.) and just adds more heat. Every once in a while he stretches his front paws down and bats at the glass. So we are doing quite well. Actually, too well. Now comes the problem. I was supposed to only have one alive at this point in the game and if one survived that was supposed to be lucky. I have at least 75 and they appear to be thriving. I would have had over 100 at this point but I gave some away to thin out the herd so to speak. Those are also thriving in the same type of terrarium set ups. The two sets of people that I gave the other mantids to, don't want any more. Mine are growing to the point that I am going to have to buy another 30 gallon terrarium. Do you have any suggestions? Quite frankly, nobody has had this type of success and all three of us who have them are not losing them any more. Our "head count" is about the same every day. This is most unexpected. We want to know specifically what species of mantid this is and if we can let them go outside this spring after it warms up maybe in June. We read somewhere that mantids are beneficial insects and that gardeners love them. Is this ok to do or are we messing with mantids that are now indigenous to this area. Yes, I know that they originally weren't indigenous to this area but they are here now and have been here for many years. How they survive and propagate is a mystery to me. I guess Ohio has quite a few of them too. If we can't release them, would you like to have them back? My only other alternative is to give them away to the arachnid club so those people can feed them to their tarantulas and scorpions. My boys aren't too thrilled about this idea and have begged me to contact you to take them back. Incidentally, if you don't want them, it's ok. We put a very old dog to sleep and didn't tell them so this situation would be handled much the same way. What they don't know won't upset them. I did find a High School that wanted about 10 adults and I will check around to see if there are any more takers. Anyway, if you have a spare moment, pleas get back to me and let me know if you would be interested in having some of your babies back if I shouldn't be releasing them in the woods behind my house. This is what the boys want me to do and they don't understand that this may not be the right thing to do. I thank you for such a wonderful experience. I remember the excitement of first geting them and hanging the sacs from the top of the terrarium by strings. I never imagined how nice this project was going to be. What I bought from you was truly one of the best things I ever bought on eBay.

Very Sincerely, Lori