BURBANK, Calif. — Lots of kids have hobbies, but 12-year-old Cole Cramer takes it to a whole new level.
“This is a cat mantis,” he said, introducing a large stick like creature. “Heterochaeta orientalis.”
Cole’s Burbank bedroom is crawling with bugs. Hand-drawn illustrations cover the walls. Under his bed are at least half a dozen display cases with pinned specimens: a peanut head moth, a five-horned rhinoceros beetle, among others.
“The biggest species of cicadas in the world,” said Cole, referring to one of his specimens.
Even his throw pillows have images of bugs on them, proof that his interest in insects is insatiable.
But Cole’s biggest fascination by far is the praying mantis. Although only amateurs say praying.
“All the big breeders just call them mantis,” Cole pointed out.
He would know. Even though he is only 12 years old and about to enter seventh grade, Cole is a bona fide mantis breeder and business at his website Mantis Universe is booming.
“I have bred about 30 species,” he said, surrounded by shelves full of plastic containers. “And I’ve sold a little over 150.”
He first caught the bug when he was barely a toddler.
“Ever since I was 2, I loved insects in the garden,” Cole recalled. “One day I saw a mantis in my yard and I loved it.”
That was probably a California Mantis – stagmomantis californica – and that was only the beginning. The middle schooler now buys and breeds all kinds of mantids, including some super rare specimens like the devil’s flower mantis.
He mostly sells to other breeders, but during the pandemic, Cole decided to reach out to his local peers. He made a flyer offering pet mantises for sale and his mom, Jessica, put it on Facebook.
“He had like 10-12 to sell,” she said, “and in two hours, they were gone.”
Since then he’s had new offerings every month and says mantids make the perfect pandemic pet or just good practice if your kid has been pestering you for something more complicated like a puppy.
“They are low maintenance,” Cole said. “These guys live for about a year or two.”
While some parents might be creeped out to have a house full of crawlies, Cole’s parents have fully embraced and even helped foster his fascination.
“Sometimes it’s hard for kids to find their passion early on,” Cole’s mom, Jessica, said. “It gets me choked up because I think about he’s already found his. We just love supporting and make sure we do everything we can to make it happen.”
This is not passing fad for Cole, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to grow up to be a mantologist.
“Mantologist is not a thing,” he pointed out, shaking his head.
But he would like to be an entomologist. Specifically, a field entomologist. “That’s when they’re discovering things out in nature,” he said.
And even though there are 1,800 known species of mantids in the world, he said there could be thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of others still out there.
“So I could discover a mantis one day,” Cole said with a twinkle in his eye.
No doubt he will and when he does, he’ll get to name it, something like “phyllocrania paradoxa,” although maybe he’ll do future scientists a favor and just go with Cole Junior.
