Micromantis id please :D he's the size of an amano shrimp!

[Hadla]

Also an illegal alien lol! The guy brought him home from Mexico in a water bottle with a piece of rock! And I feel so lucky to have him! He's the tiniest and cutest mantis I've ever seen. So he's from the Caribbean and I narrowed it down to five species after looking through the entire list! It's probably impossible to id him, but it's hard to get a clear pic! I really need to get a macro lens for my phone. I'm still in shock of just how tiny he is! Only got him yesterday and he's still in that container because I have no idea how I'm going to house him without losing him forever! Anyway I'm anxious to post this since I couldn't 5 hours ago as the site said the server was busy :/ but anyway here he is yay I'm a three mantis person again! Well more like 2.25 mantis person!

 

[Gonodactylus]

About all I can say for sure is that it is a juvenile Neogonodactylus. If I had to guess I would say it could be N. bredini. Judging from the size it is probably about 6 months old.

Roy

 

[Hadla]

thanks so much! I greatly appreciate it! Will definitely work on getting a clearer pic

 

[Hadla]

How awesome would it be to turn out a wennerae!!! Yay!

Edit: if this helps for iding, the mantis was hiding in a rock, came out and was eventually caught by scooping up the water when a wave passed... I'll get the full story again

 

[Gonodactylus]

N. wennerae and N. bredini are almost impossible to tell apart. I'm guessing N. bredini because this species lives in very shallow water (low intertidal) and is likely to be picked up in a tidepool or on an exposed reef flat or grass bed. N. wennerae occur deeper and would be more likely to be encountered by someone on SCUBA.

Roy

 

[Hadla]

Ok thanks should I worry about feeding it if it has a few pounds of live rock? Like I can just feed the tank and it'll find it's own food right? Not used to this! I can always get some copepods on ebay