Baby Praying Mantis!

[Mutley]

I woke up to find at least three of these little critters on my plants. Aren't they cute? The biggest one was about 1/2 inch long.





I don't know why I suddenly have these guys on my plants but they're good for keeping destructive bugs away! :applause:

[billyskank]

1. I think it's a *preying* mantis

They're hunters, and not particularly known for their piety. :)

[ghostsofgiants]

16. Wikipedia knows all

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praying_mantis

[Mutley]

18. Great information!

Thanks!

[Spinzonner]

2. Yeah, but they grow up to be man-eating harlots

potentially

[Mutley]

9. As it should be.

;P

[Mutley]

3. Is it?

Praying... Preying... I always thought it was Praying since they look like they're praying.

[billyskank]

4. Hmmm. Not sure.

Preying mantis gets 25,800 Google hits. Praying mantis gets 424,000. I may be wrong!

[Mutley]

6. I saw one site that said it's spelled either way.

So I guess both are acceptable... :shrug:

[Spinzonner]

8. The dictionary get one hit for "Praying Mantis"

While Preying is a common (mistaken) reference and a good description of their behavior, the name is Praying Mantis based upon their pose.

[BiggJawn]

5. We found DOZENS of egg cases last fall.

We check for egg cases as we clear off and shred and burn in the fall.
Take the cases and put them around the garden to hatch in the Spring.

Oh, BTW, they *ARE* cannibalistic....

[Mutley]

7. I know the females will eat the males after mating.

Do they eat each other all the time?

[fortyfeetunder]

20. I think it's just the females eating the males after mating

After all, that eliminates the possibility of infidelity!

[Mutley]

21. Ha! They prefer the single mom lifestyle.

:rofl:

[mike_c]

30. no, they're visual predators who will eat virtually any insect...

...in the right size class that moves within their strike distance, including their brothers and sisters.

The bit about females eating males during mating actually has a biological basis-- the female eats the male's head first, while they're copulating. Insect nervous systems are pretty broadly distributed, so the male's body continues to copulate even after his head is destroyed, and in the process he is likely to transfer more sperm than he would otherwise, thus increasing his own reproductive success-- male mantids have a bi-modal reproductive strategy, with the greatest payoff USUALLY coming from multiple matings, but a decent and more assured payoff coming from maximal insemination of one female. And the female gets a protein rich meal to put toward egg development, too.

[Mutley]

31. wow. you know a lot about these guys.

[mike_c]

32. lol-- I'm an entomologist....

Nice pics, BTW!

[Mutley]

34. That explains it.

Lol.

And thanks! :hi:

[Mutley]

36. and, in the second picture, why is his rear end curled up like that?

Is he trying to threaten me? :rofl:

[mike_c]

40. who knows...?

Insects change the shape of their abdomens for lots of reasons, including temperture regulation, respiration, and yes, defense displays. I think mantids likely do it to control their balance, as well.

[kanrok]

48. "so the male's body continues to copulate even after his head is destroyed

Sounds familiar. :)

[eyepaddle]

41. Actually, sexual cannibalism among praying mantis'

is fairly rare. It happens in the lab where the male is hemmed in and cannot escape. In nature the males are generally not so constrained.

A lot of arthropods mate face-to-face (especially spiders) and they just don't don't have the mental capacity to distinguish paramours from targets--hence all paramours BECOME targets.

Tough break for the boy bugs. :(

Although I don't think there are many insects that get to die peacefully in bed!

[mike_c]

52. yeah, you're right-- that bimodal male repro strategy...

...strongly favors living to love another day! It's just that losing his head isn't entirely selected against, as one might surmise. Female mantids are pretty hardwired to strike anything that passes through a strike zone in their visual field, so it REALLY behooves the males to stay out of sight during copulation. Presumably this reflex is at least partly inhibited during mating, since the males don't attack the females, but I have seen males in cop with the female happily munching her way down his prothorax....

[NashVegas]

37. Sometimes DURING Mating

How you like that? Sturdy fellows.

[Mutley]

38. Interesting fetish!

:silly:

[BiggJawn]

50. When they're very young they do.

If they hatch before there's plenty of ther things for them to eat....

[mike_c]

28. that's why they're only marginal commercial biocontrol agents....

You can buy the egg cases (at least in some states) to put in your garden in the spring, but the hatchlings are adapted to disperse as rapidly as possible to avoid being eaten by their siblings, so they don't usually stay put in the garden where they were meant to eat other bugs.

[Mutley]

29. Well, I hope that at least one of these guys decides to stick around.

[dogonarug]

42. Had one for months

Just outside my backdoor, She would hang out on the stucco wall near the eaves(lots O bugs)From the early brown stage to the full blown green stage, she grew to About 4 inches long...She would turn her triangular head and look down at me every time I went thru the door. One day She was on the ground spittin up brown goo and died the next day. She was a good bug.

[Mutley]

43. That's sad!

Ate someone who didn't agree with her, eh?

[dogonarug]

44. Maybe, or old age

Don't know their lifespan, She lived between 3-4 months. What was cool was that She seemed to know I meant her no harm...could have easily reached up and squashed her yet, She would be in almost the same spot every day. I did pick her up and put her on a safe plant when she became ill...what else can you do for a vomiting bug?

[Mutley]

45. Thats about it I guess

:shrug:

[kanrok]

49. My daughter made friends with one a couple of summers ago

The mantis would allow my daughter to place it on her arm, and it would crawl around to its heart's content.

[kedrys]

10. Nifty! :)

Those photos are so cool! I've never seen baby mantises, although I always suspected they exist, kinda like baby pigeons and baby squirrels...

What kind of plants are those (pretty!), and what else is in your garden?

[Mutley]

11. Thanks!

:hi:

I had to take about 20 pictures to get 2 good ones! Lol. But thats the beauty of digital. I've never seen mantises this small until today. I was so surprised! I was spraying the leaves and they started jumping around!

The plant in the shot is a Cleome, which is a pretty bushy kind of plant. I also have a daylily and two hostas. They are all in pots for now since I don't have a yard!

[kedrys]

17. That's very cool

We have a bunch of landscaping at the new house, and I have no idea what most of those plants are, except pretty :D. No trace of neat insects, but I haven't looked.

[Mutley]

19. Well apparently some garden stores sell

the egg pods of praying mantises for you to put on your plants.

[kedrys]

22. Really? Do they eat mosquitoes, by chance?

'cause I'd much rather use natural means to get rid of the little bastards than have to blanket the yard with obnoxious chemicals...

[mike_c]

33. the young ones probably eat a few mosquitos every now and then...

...but they won't ever control mosquito populations. They're ambush predators, so they typically eat other insects that are feeding on foliage, or other predators on plants, like spiders. Mosquitos rest on foliage when they're not flying, so small mantids undoubtedly eat a few, but once they begin to grow, mosquitos are too small to be a worthwhile meal.

[kedrys]

35. As long as I have a specialist on the line...

:hi: any suggestions on non-toxic ways to control mosquito populations? Our backyard is pretty small, and we also have an inner atrium where we like to hang out. I have extreme allergic reactions to bites, so anything you can suggest would be very helpful...

[mike_c]

39. mosquito control is largely a landscape problem....

This is not the answer you wanted to hear, but the best ways to control mosquito populations are to reduce their breeding opportunities, remove resting places and dispersal corridors, and increase the density of natural mosquito predators.

Reducing breeding opportunities: This means draining unnecessary water accumulations, including ditches and puddles. Many mosquito species can successfully rear a generation of young in water that persists for only a few days, especially when it's warm and has lots of microbes, e.g. from decomposing vegetation, algae, etc. I just found mosquito larvae swimming in a inch of water trapped in an wrinkled tarp in my back yard. They do this all over the landscape, so taking care of your own property won't help unless everyone within dispersal distance around you does the same.

Remove resting places: Female mosquitoes depend on moist vegetation or humid microclimates for resting places, especially during the day. Unfortunately, most of us also like our homes surrounded by greenery, so removing those resting places is not what we usually want to do. And again, it has to be done on a large scale to really impact mosquito dispersal.

Maintaining predator populations: This is a biggie. Fish like nine-spined stickle-backed minnows, and Gambusia, are natural mosquito predators, as are lots of arthropods, especially dragonflies. Making sure that any natural breeding places like small ponds are good habitats for these natural predators helps a lot. Swallows, flycatchers, martins, and some other birds also eat lots of mosquitoes, but my personal feeling is that predators in the water are the most effective control.

Of course there are lots of larvicides, like Bt toxin, and chemical sprays that can be used, but again, even these control measures don't usually have much effect unless used over relatively large areas, or unless there is a small number of major mosquito rearing sources in your area.

One last bit of advice-- don't bother with those UV light bug zappers-- they're an utter waste of money. Mosquitoes are attracted to warmth and to CO₂ primarily-- they do not respond to UV light at all. Bug zappers don't kill mosquitoes, and they likely do kill some potential mosquito predators.

[DemBones DemBones]

46. Last summer, we tried one of those new CO2-

emitting traps. I don't remember the name of the machine but my husband got it at Home Depot and it was pricey. He hates mosquitoes bugging him outside, expecially in the pool. Repellants are smelly, icky, and toxic, and we knew the zappers didn't work.

Anyway, this thing also had some kind of attractant -- different ones for different species -- though I'm not sure they were actually pheromones. It was necessary to determine what genus you were dealing with. After months of frustration, trying different locations, different attractants, etc., and damned few mosquitoes actually trapped, he returned it and got his money back.

What puzzles us is why it didn't work better. A friend who's a parasitologist, actually a retired CDC malariologist, did research in his second career (teaching college here) on local populations of mosquitoes and biting flies (Simulium damnosum, in particular), and I fondly remember all his traps. I especially liked the one with the black beach ball as surrogate cow. (Kids, if you wear a black bathing suit, it's an invitation to certain biting flies.) His traps always WORKED though they were pretty low-tech (dry ice) and homemade.

Any ideas about the expensive gadget failure? I can ask John if we get down their way soon, or drop him a letter, but you're here NOW, LOL.

[mike_c]

51. sorry, I had to leave shortly after that last reply....

I don't know the answer to that one. I use "homemade" dry ice traps, as well as traps designed to capture gravid females looking for a place to lay their eggs.

[kedrys]

47. Thanks for the tips!

:) We're not much the gardening type, so we're working with one of our neighbors who's a really good professional landscape artist and who has done quite a bit already to clean the place up. I'll discuss your advice with him next week and see what we can do. The s.o. really wants a small pond, so maybe now's the time!

Thanks! :)

[enlightenment]

13. When they're newly hatched they're

completely transparent -- about 1/2 long. One year I was standing right next to a bush where I had placed an egg case. They started crawling out, and when I put out my hand, they just crawled right onto it. Beautiful, and utterly cool.
Mother Nature Rocks!

[Mutley]

14. Wow!

That must've been really cool!

[Jara sang]

12. Those are so cool

Especially when you are looking at one and then step to the side a bit and it's eyes follow you. Truly bizarre. Stick bugs are cool too.

[Mutley]

15. I've always liked praying mantises

they're just cool looking.

[Mutley]

23. I just found another one.

This one is bigger; about an inch long! I wonder where they're coming from!

[libodem]

24. seems like a good omen to me

[Mutley]

27. That's how I'll look at it.

A good omen... I could use one!

[ScreamingMeemie]

25. Yuck! Cool, but yuck! I am one who just has an aversion to crawly

things. but they are yuckishly cool. :hi:

[Mutley]

26. I don't like spiders and some other bugs

but praying mantises have never bothered me for some reason :shrug:

[HeeBGBz]

53. The Mantis is the coolest bug

I have a strange fascination with them. I keep that story in my tinfoil closet though.

Walking Sticks scare the hell out of me. Totally creep me out.