Triplemom's 14 Biocube mantis tank! What???

Thanks for being a tourist for me, Ivan!

 

Your mantis is absolutely gorgeous, makes me want one. Sounds like he has a great personality and is very entertaining.

Thank you so much for sharing how you built your canopy.

My dad is gonna help me make one for mine (they do say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery ;D). Excellent design.

 

In my mind, I consider our canopy to be a prototype, because apparently I pioneered a way to build a bowfront canopy where it actually looks like a canopy When this one wears our, I'm going to build another, better one. By better I just mean more secure and higher quality. And I'm definitely going with plywood over particle board >.< Pain in the butt. Glue hates particle board.

 

I agree with the particle board. I plan on using a nice wood that I can sand down to a good finish next time. Mine looks awesome from 5 ft away..but when you get up close it looks kinda bad..definitely serves its purpose though!

 

My dad just bought me furniture grade oak plywood for it...am sooo excited to make it. I can't thank you enough for comming up with the plan (and sharing it) the way I was gonna do it is where the top flat part lifted up which would add to the height of the tank and I'm short. Your way is far better...can get to the lights and the tank easier.

 

Yeah I originally thought of making the top flat part be the hinged part and the only part that lifted up. But then the bow at the front wouldn't be as strong, and getting to the tank and the lights would be a huge pain. So I made the whole front go with it Very easy to lift, and opens up to about half the tank's width. Super easy to slide the lights in and out as well.

 

It's been about 2 weeks or so since we've had a full visual of Bo. He's been hiding in his den, no doubt because of a molt (this would be his second). We can see him moving around, and he did peek out enough yesterday to grab a piece of krill. He was kicking sand out of his den last night, so I'm hoping he comes back out soon! These molts always make me a little nervous...

 

Hope he shows up soon...I wanna see too.

 

do you know if he changed colors or not?

 

Eh he may be a bit darker. Not much of a change. But he definitely molted for sure. He started poking out a bit more today, so hopefully he'll be fully out again soon.