Phrynus marginemaculatus babies

[aphono]

P. marginemaculatus successfully hatched her eggs last night. 108 days between courtship(April 27) and hatch(Aug 13).

Should she have food now or wait until the babies molt and moved off her back first before feeding her again?

 

[chanda]

Hey, congratulations!!! That's fantastic!!!

I've never kept that species, but with the D. diadema I will usually offer small crickets even while they are carrying eggs or babies. I've had a mother diadema eat a bunch of her babies as soon as they left her back once, so I try to keep them fed at least once a week now, even with babies. I do opt for smaller prey when they're carrying babies, though - and will usually toss in a bit of food (veggies, dog kibble) for the crickets, too - just in case they don't get eaten right away.

 

[aphono]

Thank you!

Came across a comment somewhere to feed less often with smaller prey while they're carrying eggs. Based on that she she got fed a pinhead cricket per week. Glad that turned out to be the right thing to do. Just didn't recall anything about feeding mothers with babies. I'll feed her either a pinhead or super small cricket pronto!

 

[Hardus nameous]

A few days ago I fed mine a super small cricket while she had the young on her back, and the cricket appears to have been eaten. I figured they would be well protected on her back and the cricket wasn't anything momma couldn't easily handle.

 

[aphono]

A few days ago I fed mine a super small cricket while she had the young on her back, and the cricket appears to have been eaten. I figured they would be well protected on her back and the cricket wasn't anything momma couldn't easily handle.

Thanks for the reassurance! Put a pinhead cricket in with her a few minutes ago.

The babies are way cute.

 

[aphono]

Update: All of the babies already molted and are off mother's back. I missed the event & none of the babies are showing the fresh molt colors so it may have happened any time from yesterday/last night or the day before.

They hatched out Aug 14 so this makes it 6-7 days on the mother's back.

Do I keep the babies together or separate them asap? I did not have any luck keeping the juveniles/adults communally.

Also- the mother took a pinhead and a small cricket in the interim. I believe taking her out now is the right thing to do.. correct?

 

[Greasylake]

Do I keep the babies together or separate them asap? I did not have any luck keeping the juveniles/adults communally.

You should be able to keep them together for at least a little while, but if you're worried about cannibalism it should be perfectly fine to separate them now.

 

[aphono]

You should be able to keep them together for at least a little while, but if you're worried about cannibalism it should be perfectly fine to separate them now.

Thanks! The mother was separating herself from the babies(slings? whiplings?) so I decided(got a little nervous actually) to separate last night.

Seems there's 15 babies in total. Found an old comment on here saying it was better to keep the babies of this species communally for a while so I'm trying that until the first signs of cannibalism.

 

[Daniel Edwards]

I just posted a thread just like you but didn't see this ahead of time. I got estimated 12-15 babies too. Mom died but the other 2 adults are keepng to themselves. Babies are doing great. Green and orange! I am adding cider laced fruit pieces in the terrarium and they linger around it for the fruit flies... So far so good...

 

[aphono]

I just posted a thread just like you but didn't see this ahead of time. I got estimated 12-15 babies too. Mom died but the other 2 adults are keepng to themselves. Babies are doing great. Green and orange! I am adding cider laced fruit pieces in the terrarium and they linger around it for the fruit flies... So far so good...

Cool! I'll go check it out. By the way- turns out they handle pinhead crickets just fine. Quite happy about that as I abhor fruit flies & they cannot molt on a diet based solely of fruit flies. Try offering other prey if you can. Recently learned some of them while very little/young will accept prekilled prey such as chopped up mealworms. Haven't tried that though.

I also deliberately introduced and 'fed' the springtails to make them explode in the enclosure, just in case. No idea if they ever ate those but..

 

[aphono]

Sept 27- started to see first evidence of molts. 36 days after leaving their mother. Freshly molted with old molt(on bottom) on left side of pic.

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