Roach (or Mantid) Display - 12" X 12" Planted Exo Terra

Roach (or Mantis) Display - 12" X 12" Planted Exo Terra

Roach (or Mantis) Display - 12" X 12" Planted Exo Terra

This is a new little project that I have a good start on, but I am still trying to figure out livestock selection. I am mainly a plant hobbyist and first and foremost I want to develop this as a nice planted display. I have pondered some kind of small herp, but don't haven't found any that appeal to me very much. The setup might not be very good for most kinds of dart frogs--pictures below will detail the setup--so I wonder about instead using some kind of small roach.

The setup is a "Forest Floor" terrarium that uses this false bottom plate to hold planter pots. As such it does not have any substrate layer to speak of, but the bottom will be covered with natural leaf litter. It is thus unsuitable for animals that like to dig.



In addition to some plants planted into the bottom I also made this manzanita feature to position in the middle of the layout. The manzanita branches are mounted to a 1/4" plastic plate suspended from the enclosure top plastic rim.



Here it is in the enclosure.



I wanted to plant the manzanita with some small epiphytic plants, so I wrapped some long-fibre sphagnum moss around the pieces facing toward the front that would be in the brighter light.



And here it is planted.





To finish up the planting I positioned a few small terrestrial plants in the bottom, then covered that false bottom assembly with leaf litter.



I'd love to hear any ideas you might have for livestock selection. Those miniature epiphytic ferns planted on the manzanita require very high humidity (90%+) all the time, so I will keep this closed up and with misting every day. I might have considered a small tarantula for it, but it will be too wet. What about using a small pet roach species? It would be great to select one that might be a bit more inclined to walk around and not hide while the lights are on. It would need to be pretty small and light to avoid destructive trampling of those little ferns. I considered trying a mantis of some kind too. There are a few potentially good choices among the "Climbing Pet Roaches" in the Roach crossing online store...

http://www.roachcrossing.com/climbingpetroaches.htm

I already have a small culture (no adults yet) of Gyna lurida nymphs that I bought there. I wish there were better descriptions of size and care information there. Does anybody have any experience with some of the less common species there?

Thanks for reading. I'll be interested to hear any suggestions at all.

Thats an awesome display for ANY bug lucky enough to live there! Good job!

Thanks! Like I said I think it's going to be too wet for a tarantula, so I hope I can figure out some other possibilities.

That's absolutely incredible, I don't have any ideas what to put in there but I'm sure it's plenty good for most tarantulas and pretty much any roach. (although roaches might chew on some of the leaves)

Eric

Darkpredator said:

That's absolutely incredible, I don't have any ideas what to put in there but I'm sure it's plenty good for most tarantulas and pretty much any roach. (although roaches might chew on some of the leaves)

Eric

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Thank you. Yes I wondered about chewing. I hope there might be some roaches less inclined to do that(???). I really do think this will be too humid for a tarantula. It will be closed up and with almost 100% humidity all the time. I do plant to install a small CPU fan to keep the air blowing around. Those little epiphytes grow a lot better if you give them a bit of a breeze.

That would be a sweet set for Dart frogs.

-Wade

Humidity can sometimes be dangerous for mantids if it allows bacteria to get out of control. That said, a mantid or mantids may be one of the best insect choices for this setup. You could do some research on mantid forums to find the species which do best in those conditions.
Small, active, nonburrowing roaches like Pseudomops or Parcoblatta or maybe even Elliptorhina could be worth trying. But yeah, they might nibble the decorations.

Wadew said:

That would be a sweet set for Dart frogs.

-Wade

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Thanks! I did think about dart frogs, but I think I want to use some kind of bug instead.

Tenodera said:

Humidity can sometimes be dangerous for mantids if it allows bacteria to get out of control. That said, a mantid or mantids may be one of the best insect choices for this setup. You could do some research on mantid forums to find the species which do best in those conditions.
Small, active, nonburrowing roaches like Pseudomops or Parcoblatta or maybe even Elliptorhina could be worth trying. But yeah, they might nibble the decorations.

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I will have to ask around about mantises some more. I already have a little group of P. paradoxa nymphs on the way with a trade that I arranged yesterday. A roach would be nice but like I said I really want to maintain and grow that planting so I don't want to use any plant eaters. I have a couple of Elliptorhina javanica and whenever I put kale and other greens in their enclosure they eat it right away.

Well it looks like I will be putting a small group of Phyllocrania in here. I have some coming in the mail via a trade. I hope that they can travel well in this heat.

It will be very humid in this enclosure, but I am going to install a ventilation fan so I hope I can keep it fresh inside.

1- That setup is hardcore.
2- Try lots of phasmids, namely those Giant Prickly Stick Insects. Phasmids would use that to full advantage as they are communal and they are super neat to watch. Mantids are aslo awesome but not as communal and way overbalanced by that amazing setup/vivarium.
3- I need to get an amazing setup like yours, incredible.

EDIT: I should read the whole thread before posting, sorry. Make sure to keep em well fed or they'll kill each other anyways.

EbonyKatana1664 said:

1- That setup is hardcore.
2- Try lots of phasmids, namely those Giant Prickly Stick Insects. Phasmids would use that to full advantage as they are communal and they are super neat to watch. Mantids are aslo awesome but not as communal and way overbalanced by that amazing setup/vivarium.
3- I need to get an amazing setup like yours, incredible.

EDIT: I should read the whole thread before posting, sorry. Make sure to keep em well fed or they'll kill each other anyways.

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Hey thanks! I am in the United States, so I cannot legally keep any non-native pet phasmid. I would also worry about a walking stick munching on those delicate little (expensive!) plants. And a really big one would fill up the whole enclosure; it's the small Exo Terra and only 12" X 12" footprint.

This setup was pretty easy to make. The only more demanding part was arranging those manzanita branches in a way that I liked.

hydrophyte said:

Hey thanks! I am in the United States, so I cannot legally keep any non-native pet phasmid. I would also worry about a walking stick munching on those delicate little (expensive!) plants. And a really big one would fill up the whole enclosure; it's the small Exo Terra and only 12" X 12" footprint.

This setup was pretty easy to make. The only more demanding part was arranging those manzanita branches in a way that I liked.

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Oh well good luck, Phyllocrania are great and from what Ive gathered, one of the few communal mantids.

Here's another setup that I just started working on. This one is in an 18" X 18" X 24" Exo Terra at our local reptile specialty shop. It's a little bit difficult to see in this photo but you can get the general idea.



Those are pieces of Lake Superior driftwood on slate bases in there. I need to add some kind of plant to fill out the top left corner because it looks oddly empty there. I might mount a few Neoregelia on the driftwood pieces and I might also bring over some larger terrestrial plants.

They are going to put some kind of dart frog in there, but I am unsure of which species.

Sadly, I have too many bugs to devote time to making (or attempting to make--Nice work, by the way!) nice setups like this. It's always impressive to see what can be accomplished. It seems to me that creating habitat cages like this is one of the neatest aspects of the pet bug hobby, but so few people really take the time. It almost doesn't matter what you put in there. It's already beautiful, especially if plants are your hobby. I think I'd be a plant guy too, if I had just an extra three hours in my day!

It seems to me that Gyna would easily move between the potted plants and the false bottom. They really like to burrow and would probably take advantage of any gaps. There also appear to be slits in the pots. I'm just trying to understand how this would work with Gyna.

Is Manzanita less likely to mold than other woods, or is this piece somehow treated to prevent mold?

Perhaps a non-burrowing species like Ornate Velvet Roaches would work. I don't know if they'd nibble the plants though. They also climb glass. I suppose that whatever lives in that tank should stay off the glass. We're not really supposed to notice it and the underside of a bug on the glass would really shift our perspective away from the decor. Blaberus giganteus or peppered roaches would look nice in there, though the nymphs are rather small and might also have burrowing issues.

I'd like to see some millipedes trucking around in a tank like that and even isopods to add another dimension to the ecosystem.

Bugs In Cyberspace said:

Sadly, I have too many bugs to devote time to making (or attempting to make--Nice work, by the way!) nice setups like this. It's always impressive to see what can be accomplished. It seems to me that creating habitat cages like this is one of the neatest aspects of the pet bug hobby, but so few people really take the time. It almost doesn't matter what you put in there. It's already beautiful, especially if plants are your hobby. I think I'd be a plant guy too, if I had just an extra three hours in my day!

It seems to me that Gyna would easily move between the potted plants and the false bottom. They really like to burrow and would probably take advantage of any gaps. There also appear to be slits in the pots. I'm just trying to understand how this would work with Gyna.

Is Manzanita less likely to mold than other woods, or is this piece somehow treated to prevent mold?

Perhaps a non-burrowing species like Ornate Velvet Roaches would work. I don't know if they'd nibble the plants though. They also climb glass. I suppose that whatever lives in that tank should stay off the glass. We're not really supposed to notice it and the underside of a bug on the glass would really shift our perspective away from the decor. Blaberus giganteus or peppered roaches would look nice in there, though the nymphs are rather small and might also have burrowing issues.

I'd like to see some millipedes trucking around in a tank like that and even isopods to add another dimension to the ecosystem.

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Hey thanks so much for looking that over. I had wondered about the Deropeltis. I saw your YourTube video of them and I imagined they might walk around in a setup like this. That might be OK if they climb glass. I would add just a few adult individuals to such a display and if they spent half their time climbing the wood features and half the time on the glass I think the effect would still be pretty cool. I would love to hear any other suggestions you might have for bugs to go into planted displays.

I wondered also about roaches getting under the false bottom. For most species it would be best to just use adults as the display animals and not count on getting very good reproduction because nymphs might likely get trapped underneath. Do you think a Gyna lurida could squeeze through an 1/8" gap?

---------- Post added 06-21-2012 at 02:57 PM ----------

Here's another shot to show the terrestrial plants a little bit better. That is a Costus woodsonii spiral ginger right in the middle with a couple of Pilea grandifolia on the left. I am trying to figure out what the fern is.

I must say that is a very beautiful enclosure. I keep a lot of epiphytes in the terrarium with my whites tree frog, he doesn't bother them at all, but they would quickly sit on those little ferns. Since your looking for something more crawly how about a true spider? Their are lots and lots of species to choose from for color and size, and a lot of them enjoy high humidity. I live in MS and it gets unbearably hot and humid this time of year, yet the spiders still spin all day long. I doubt you would want your branches mucked up with cob webs from cellar spiders or something like that, but what about a small orb weaver? Their webs are intricate and beautiful, and I think they like the humidity because they are always spinning over my koi pond.

http://www.insectidentification.org/insect-description.asp?identification=Venusta-Orchard-Spider

This is the species I see the most over/around my koi pond, they're small, pretty, and their webs are not incredibly large, but they are beautiful in structure. With them being such a small spider you could even still incorporate isopods and/or small roaches

Arianji said:

I must say that is a very beautiful enclosure. I keep a lot of epiphytes in the terrarium with my whites tree frog, he doesn't bother them at all, but they would quickly sit on those little ferns. Since your looking for something more crawly how about a true spider? Their are lots and lots of species to choose from for color and size, and a lot of them enjoy high humidity. I live in MS and it gets unbearably hot and humid this time of year, yet the spiders still spin all day long. I doubt you would want your branches mucked up with cob webs from cellar spiders or something like that, but what about a small orb weaver? Their webs are intricate and beautiful, and I think they like the humidity because they are always spinning over my koi pond.

http://www.insectidentification.org/insect-description.asp?identification=Venusta-Orchard-Spider

This is the species I see the most over/around my koi pond, they're small, pretty, and their webs are not incredibly large, but they are beautiful in structure. With them being such a small spider you could even still incorporate isopods and/or small roaches

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That's a great idea! It would be fun to do some research and experimentation to find the species that spin webs with the best size and shape for various kinds of enclosures.

I am also interested in figuring out methods that are reproducible. I'd like to find out more about potentially maintaining some of these spiders as captive colonies.

Well that species I showed you the females and males seem to stay close. The female usually has a larger web with a male in a smaller web just a few inches away. So they might be possible to breed in captivity. If any enclosure was nice enough to promote captive breeding it would be yours.

Wow, that's a really impressive vivarium.

I was trying to think of things to put in it too, and the huntsman spider H. boiei is a large spider from Malaysia that comes from a very humid habitat. I've seen at least one person here who was selling them at one point, and I know of another member here who has one.

Did I mention that the males are a stunning green color? OwO



I've never kept one, but I've heard that they're lightning-fast when they want to be, so I guess I'd be careful about that. Perhaps installing some extra cover of some sort would make them feel more secure?

LordRaiden said:

Wow, that's a really impressive vivarium.

I was trying to think of things to put in it too, and the huntsman spider H. boiei is a large spider from Malaysia that comes from a very humid habitat. I've seen at least one person here who was selling them at one point, and I know of another member here who has one.

Did I mention that the males are a stunning green color? OwO

I've never kept one, but I've heard that they're lightning-fast when they want to be, so I guess I'd be careful about that. Perhaps installing some extra cover of some sort would make them feel more secure?

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That looks really cool, but I wonder if it would be too big for this setup(?). This is just the 12" X 12" X 18" Exo Terra.