Indigo Evenings

Well, the mantis isn't messing around. She already molted!


Here she is, just slightly bigger!


And here's her shed.

I think this is probably her i5 instar. The cup she came in says she reached i4 on 7/29. I should ask Alex if he knows how many instars Giant Rainforest Mantises have, since he did most of the research on them. A quick search says 7 or so? Though she's still got a lot of growing to do!

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So last night, I said that Bella had still been behaving strangely through the day and evening, but had finally settled down and was sleeping in between us on the bed.

Alex nudged her around 10:30 for her last outdoor trip of the night... and she jumped off the bed like everything was perfectly normal. (She had been very leery of trying to jump up or down from anywhere, like she didn't trust that she could judge the jump.) Alex took her out, and said she was like... 95% normal. She still gave the stairs a serious sideeye when they walked past, but otherwise was acting like everything was fine. When she got back in, she jumped up on her step to get up on the bed, and then promptly settled back down for the evening.

I didn't want to jinx anything, but then this morning she was back to 100%. No pacing, no agitation, able to jump off the bed. Didn't even look over at the stairs this morning. Back to her "fancy, energetic show-dog trot" when she's on the leash, instead of the somewhat more wary body language she displayed yesterday.

So it took about 25 or 26 hours, instead of the 24 we were originally trying to wait out, but... now everything seems to be fine. We're obviously keeping an eye on her, and if this happens again, we'll try to get her to the vet while the symptoms are happening so she can be checked out. But for now... whatever it was seems to have passed.

I'm relieved, but also do very much wish I had an idea of what had caused it. For now, we hope it's done.

Bella slept through the night (probably better than I did, ha.)

While she didn't get up until I did this morning, once I was up, she was back to similar behaviors as last night. She wanted to get up and pace back and forth on the bed, kept looking down at the floor like she thought something was down there. :/

She was much easier to distract from her agitation than she was last night: she'd redirect it to playing with a toy or chewing on a bone.

Alex said he'd see how she did through the rest of the day. Reportedly, she followed him around while he was doing stuff around the apartment, but didn't seem to need to pace as much. Once he was done with stuff and sat down on the bed, she got on the bed with him (though he had to lift her up.) While she was still a bit restless, she would lay back down when he told her to, and then she did spend a chunk of the day asleep.

So it seemed like she was doing a bit better... but it's still not back to normal. She has the same sort of nervous "looking for something" behavior when there's nothing to distract her, and did the same in the car. She seems very concerned with the apartment stairs when we walk past them. Alex says he thinks she seems confused, but only about location, like she doesn't really know where she is. She recognizes us, and commands, and everything else, though.

She's still eating normally (and still peeing/pooping fine). Still no new symptoms of pain or distress or anything. She's easily distractable with toys, playing, or toys, and she wants to play and interact, but when there's nothing to distract her, she's back to agitated. (Though since Alex and I both settled into bed, she's been happy enough to just sort of doze between us.)

She can very obviously still see (she recognized me from half a block down the sidewalk today after work), and she's fine to catch treats and take them easily. But I sort of wonder if something has changed with her vision. Her eyes look fine, pupils are reactive, blinking normally, but she's very unsure about getting up or down off of things, making me wonder if her depth perception is okay. (Though again, she's able to see and judge where things are, so maybe it isn't that.)

I'm not sure. I'm relieved that she does not seem to be in pain or distress, but it's clear that something is wrong, and it did not pass after a night of sleep.

Alex is going to call and leave a voicemail for our vet and see when we can bring her in.