Praying Mantis

Description:

Medium-sized, non-aggressive praying mantis indigenous to the southern United States. They vary greatly in color, ranging from a dusty brown to gray or green. Adult females usually measure up to 7 cm long, while males peak at around 5 cm. Mature females have bud wings that cover only three quarters of her abdomen; adult males have full wings. It is not uncommon for Carolina mantises to eat others of their own species whenever they can, and one in every four female mantises feeds on the male Read more: http://www.ehow.com/info_8204392_praying...

Habitat:

On sumac in meadow near Lewisville Lake.

Notes:

Mother Nature has gifted the mature praying mantis with a number of adaptations that make it a fearsome hunter. Very unusual in the insect world, the mantid’s elongated thorax functions like a neck, enabling the triangular head to turn almost 360 degrees. This feature combined with its two huge compound eyes and three single eyes, give the praying mantis a real advantage in spotting its next dinner. Each foreleg is modified to fold back like a pocket knife, with serrated, spiny edges that end with sharp hooks: all the better to catch and hold a squirmy lunch desperate to get away. Another advantage for the praying mantis is its coloring. Not only does the mantid’s green to grayish-brown offer excellent camouflage in the plant foliage where it prefers to hunt, this color can be somewhat altered by an individual to better match its specific surroundings. The praying mantis will sit and wait or very slowly stalk its prey, sometimes swaying back and forth to mimic plants moving in a breeze, only to become lightning fast when it snares its unfortunate target.