Stick Insect Feeding: Bramble in a Jar, the Right Plant for the Species, and Water That Cannot Drown a Nymph

A stick insect eats leaves, and that is the entire diet. The craft of feeding one is in three things: the right plant for the species, keeping cut foliage alive for days, and giving the insect water it can drink without drowning in. Here is each, and the reasons an insect stops eating.

The Right Plant

Every species has one or more plants it eats and will refuse the rest, so the first question is which species you have. Almost all stick insects eat the leaves of bramble, the blackberry and its relatives in the genus Rubus, which is why bramble is the default food in the hobby and grows in any hedgerow. Many species also take oak and hawthorn, and raspberry, another Rubus, works where bramble does. From there it goes species by species: the Indian stick insect also takes privet and ivy, rose and eucalyptus suit others, and the Peruvian fern stick insect eats bracken and other ferns and nothing on the bramble list at all.

A new species goes onto the plant its breeder fed it, and a change of plant is offered alongside the old one rather than instead of it, since an insect that refuses the new leaf will starve beside it.

Keeping the Leaves Fresh

Cut stems standing in water beat a pile of picked leaves, because foliage kept that way stays good for several days instead of crisping overnight. Stand the branches in a jar or cup of water exactly like cut flowers, weighted with sand or stones at the bottom so it cannot tip, and replace the food when the leaves become too dry or the branches are stripped bare. A stick insect should have food at all times.

Wash the leaves. Foliage collected near a road carries traffic residue, and foliage from a garden, park or verge can carry pesticide or herbicide, which the invertebrate pesticide hazards guide treats as the biggest single risk to a pet invertebrate. Wash the branches and shake them dry before they go in, and collect from hedgerows away from roads and treated ground. Washing also removes hitchhiking insects and spiders that would otherwise share the enclosure.

Feed hatchlings fresh, daily. Newly hatched nymphs have trouble chewing into a dried leaf. Cutting the edges of the leaves lets them reach the juices, and fresh foliage goes in daily at that stage rather than every few days.

Water

Stick insects drink droplets, not from a dish. A fine mist over the inside of the enclosure and all the food plant each evening gives them water to drink and raises the humidity at once. The mist is fine rather than heavy, and not aimed at the insects: a nymph can drown in a large droplet, and the same jar that holds the food is the other drowning risk. A few species, the Haaniella among them, want an open bowl of water low in the enclosure as well, and the species sheet says which.

Foods to Avoid

Any plant not on the species' list, which it will simply refuse. Any leaf from sprayed or roadside ground, unwashed. Wilted or dried foliage, which a nymph cannot chew. Lettuce, greens and fruit from the kitchen, which are not stick insect food. And food left in an open jar.

Why Stick Insects Stop Eating

A molt is coming. The commonest reason by far. A young stick insect stops eating a day or two before it sheds, hangs motionless from the roof, and starts again once the new skin has hardened. The invertebrate molting guide covers the height and the grippable ceiling that let the molt succeed.

The leaves are dry. Foliage that has crisped is not food. Replace it.

The plant is wrong. An insect on a plant its species does not eat will starve rather than adapt. Go back to bramble and offer the alternative alongside.

It is cold. Most kept species do well at ordinary room temperature, and a room that drops into the low 60s slows feeding to nothing. Warm the room rather than the enclosure.

It is an adult female laying. Egg-laying females eat less for a while, and the stick insect handling guide covers what to do with the eggs, which for most keepers is the freezer.

When to Worry

A stick insect that has stopped eating for a day or two and is hanging still is molting. One that has stopped eating for a week on fresh, correct foliage, is losing its grip on the mesh, or is missing legs after a crowded molt is the animal in trouble, and there is no vet for it: the fix is the plant, the water and the space. The praying mantis is the other kept insect whose feeding runs on the molt clock, from the opposite end of the food chain.

Fresh bramble in a covered jar, washed, replaced before it dries, and a fine mist in the evening. It is the simplest diet of any pet insect, and every death it causes is a dry leaf, a wrong plant, or an open jar.

Sources & Further Reading