It's another

creature feature

The series where I tell you more about an animal that you don't often see on YouTube

And that you might not know things about.

Today's creature is called Malay.

Say hello to Malay.

My little friend

my litt- does that work?

Say hello to ma-lay-tle friend!

Get it, 'cos her name's Malay

I don't know if they're going to get it, Malay

Ha Malay over here is a Jungle Nymph. Yes. I know that name is amazing.

I wish that I could run around claiming to be a Jungle Nymph, but alas I am a homosapien

In simpler terms,

she is a giant stick insect. She is one of the largest insects in the world

I believe the Jungle Nymphs actually lay the largest eggs in the insect world

At least, by mass any way

The eggs are really huge and the eggs are so cool. It looks like dinosaur eggs

They really look like something out of Jurassic park

When the eggs hatch and the nymphs are born they're very, very small

they almost look kind of like a- like a large ant

And straightaway they start eating, eating, eating

Just foraging, trying to get as much size as possible.

The males, you can always tell the males are very dark, black color.

The females are kind of like a beige color

That's how you know that they're going to grow up into being females

But their life span is very short

Their life span is only two years which is amazing when you think it can take a year to a year and a half for the eggs to hatch.

That's pretty extraordinary really

Jungle Nymphs come from the Malay Archipelago

Malay is an adult female Jungle Nymph

the male Jungle nymphs look completely different

Looking at the male as compared to the female

the males are much, much smaller the females are

Vastly bigger than the males also the males have wings which they can use for flight

They can actually fly whereas the female over here, Malay

She does have wings let me show you

now malay does have these beautiful wings at the back here that actually pink underneath

However

She can't use them for flight

the only reason that she would ever really use her wings which are not strong enough to actually lift

her body, um

If their threatened they can actually move them together and make a kind of like a trembling hissing sound and that's supposed to keep predators away

She does look very f- That was in my nose.

That was legit in my nostril

Look in the eyeball. (This is far more hazardous than I had expected) they will infect your eyeball juice with their wandering groping Antennae

Not again in the nose. Oh my God malay over here is a herbivore

She's only interested really in bramble leaves privet leaves and a couple of other leaves such as raspberry

Although Jungle Nymphs are this beautiful lime green color. They're actually nocturnal meaning

They wake up at nighttime

They might come out in the daytime for a little bit just to have a little bit of a browse and some food

But typically they're mostly active at night which is why she's starting to wake up because we're coming up to 8:00 p.m. here in the U.K.

Malay is Full-Grown.

This is the size of an adult female all she has to do now is deposit eggs

So can you see down here on her abdomen? She's got this sort of hatch over here.

This thick part well inside there. She's forming an egg

Can you see that browness inside her that's a large egg which she's going to get ready to deposit after she deposits her egg

Sadly that is the end of their lifespan

And they will pass away shortly afterwards

She will actually take the time to climb down and find some moss or some nice moist soil

And she will actually bury down into soil and gently deposit that egg

It actually takes between 11 and 18 months for the egg to hatch. Now when it comes to protecting herself

she doesn't have any Venom or any poison and

Usually you would think that they might have a venom or a poison because of this bright Vivid color. In the animal Kingdom

Bright Vivid colors are usually a warning sign. It's saying stay away from me

I taste disgusting please don't eat me but from Malay over here

She has other ways to protect herself

Number one what she does is she stays very still a lot of the time she would usually be near the tops of trees

So these green colors make her look a bit like a leaf the other things she can do is if she's being attacked

Do you see these amazing spiky legs of hers? These spiky legs I can tell you from experience

Are no joke they feel akin to those of a rosebush if you imagine gripping hard onto a rosebush thorn

That's what their legs feel like she does like an amazing thigh grip on you

And it hurts so much so that you just want to shake her off and let her go

Something else that Malay can do if she can pretend to be a scorpion

I don't think she's going to do it for us today because she's very used to being handled

And I really don't want to scare her

but this abdomen over here if she were really

Scared she could bring it right over to where her head is to make it look like the scorpion sting and that's supposed to

Threaten you. Malay is also a little bit of a drama queen something else

She can do if she senses danger if she can let go of the branches that she's holding herself on and fall to the floor

That way she can make a very quick escape from danger if she senses any.

But also to appear dead because plenty of animals don't want to eat something that's already dead so she basically just goes like oh

I can't take it anymore and just like throws herself onto the floor so um

She's a little bit of a drama queen we share that in common. Don't we yes we do

Oh, spiky on the nose. Now let's talk about Jungle Nymphs as pets because yes

you can keep them as a pet and I think that they make fascinating pets for the right family or

Individual. The way that Malay is kept is she is in a large Flexarium. A flexarium that we got from Exo Terra.

The Flexarium's are great because they enable her to climb. Because the flexarium is made of a sort of very durable waterproof fabric

Um it enables them to be able to climb all over whereas if they were in a glass tank for example

They wouldn't enjoy it quite as much. We spray them twice a day with water because they like a high humidity and they do have

Special heating so the heating the way that we keep them is we keep them at about Thirty degrees Celsius

I don't know what that is in Fahrenheit

I'll have to insert that somewhere

So we keep them during the heat of the day at 30 degrees Celsius and that drops down to about

22 at night. As I said before they do eat bramble leaves and privet leaves you might already have it in your garden

Or you can grow it yourself. It's super easy

It's not then you can just collect it because there's loads around, but if you are going to collect

Bramble leaves or privet leaves, just make sure that you're collecting from an area which doesn't use pesticides because pesticides

Will kill your stick insect, and we don't want to do that do we no, we'd never do that to you because you're beautiful kisses

Yass, you know it is a bit of a commitment the last thing you want to do sometimes is to go out in the rain

Or in the winter and go with your gardening gloves and your cutters and go and cut bramble leaves

But it's got to be done

so just make sure that if you are going to get them as a pet that you are going to put in the time and

effort because if you don't feed them or you feed them poorly then you're not going to get the best out of your Jungle Nymph.

To actually buy the Jungle Nymph you could probably look online there are a couple of different stores

You can look at they're not the most common stick insect to find so you won't find them just there at your local PetSmart or Petco.

Reptile Expo sometimes sell these guys or an

Invertebrate shows of course or find a breeder that would be the best thing to do find a breeder who can really give you that

Ongoing support if you have any questions, allthough

They are nocturnal all of the animals that we look after whether they are nocturnal

Or otherwise have access to Uv light so although it's not compulsory being nocturnal that they have

Special UV lights we use it anyway, and I would recommend it

You know it would just be good to give them the opportunity to bask in the Sun.

And to soak up that goodness if they wanted to remember they do come from a naturally hot and sunny climate so in my opinion

Why wouldn't they utilize some of that sun sometimes so I just think it's nice to give it to them

Just in case you know they might not come out and bask that much during the day

They might stay where it's a little bit more shady,

but at the same time. It's nice just to give them that option just in case.

Overall I think they could make a fascinating pet for the right person. I'm certainly a huge fan of them

They might be a little bit too full on for children though

you know if you are going to handle these guys it's a really strange feeling it is literally like a Living thorn bush.

deciding to climb on you and as feminine and as delicate as my hands look they are actually quite tough because of all the manual

Work that I do so just be aware that if you do have any small children in the house

And you do plan on letting them handle these guys

please do it under supervision or even give them something like some sort of glove to hold these guys with do your research and if

Possible go and see them and try handling them

in the flesh before actually committing to buy them because you might decide that it's just not the right creature for you

That said they do make fascinating pets just to observe so you don't have to um

Handle them you really don't. So yeah, you can keep them as a pet and you don't have to handle them

You can get a nice thick glove like gardening gloves and gently scoop them on top allow them to walk on there

Just be aware that their feet are very

Hook-like, and when they are on you. They are on you, and if they don't want to come off

They're not coming off very easily

They like to constantly be in contact with some surface so she will often

Grip down hard from moving from one space to another

Just realize that it can be a bit prickly and it might not be the right pet for everyone

But if you were thinking of an animal that is going to be semi low-maintenance,

Doesn't need to be taken for a walk every day, is odorless, is

Relatively clean then I think that they could be a really great choice

Don't go up on my sleeve though because I don't want you to get your feet caught

Thank you guys so much for tuning into today's creature feature

I hope that you enjoyed learning about the Jungle Nymph over here malay and of course thank you, too.

Malay over here

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it's under my fingernail get outta my fingernail oh

It was like when you cut your nail too short

Too much. Thank you guys again so much for watching and I will see you in another video shortly take care guys

Bye, Malay we have to give everybody a wave. Are you ready? Wave

There we go. Bye

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