What you learned from observing a real mantis

[Stacey]

Heres what I learned.

1. They sit around all day doing nothing
2. If a bug walks past them and they don't care.
3. Thy climb up to the top of things and stay there.
4. Every so often they grab something and if they bug kicks at them, they eat its foot and continue chewing.
5. I once put a hornet inside my mantis cage. The mantis just waited untill the hornet was under her and then beat it up. I'm not kidding, both hooks went out but folded because it was annoyed. It let the crippled hornet walk a few steps away and die and never ate it.
6. They don't eat ants.
7. They eat their brothers and sisters.
8. They are frighteningly fast, I was scared to hold one, but then I tried to and it circled my arm up to my shoulder and looked into my eyes with its black eyed alien stare, It did this faster than I could blink.
9. Mantis' seak to get fat and don't move too much. Then they lay eggs and die.
10. Vs a cicaida it just grabbed it, spun it around and ate from the back of its head, quick kill.
11. If you poke them they put their guard up and lean with the push, bobbing in their horse stance and then walk where you are pushing them. Somtimes they will hook the stick and poke with the other. If the are really ****ed they get your finger.

They really arent too exiting. How long did wang long stare at those things to learn anything.

If you put egg cases in your back yard, birds will eat them, you can't stop this. If they do succeed, you will never find them in your yard.

What have you guys learned?

[flem]

stacey

i had similar experiences, i once killed one by putting a roach in the cage! i guess it had raid on it or something. i did learn something though. i noticed that thier are a large variety of them. one in partcular was brown, no more than an inch and half long and had flaky skin which resembled the tree bark identically that it was on. it tended to cower and depend on it's camo instead of attacking/defending my twig.

[EARTH DRAGON]

I have had a few in my school to play with , but its just like anything...... they know when they are in captivity and wont react the same when on display as they would in the wild. Also I think that they wont become firece if they are not in danger, or protecting their eggs or territiory. I also know that the females are much more aggressive than the males. As flem stated I remember my teacher told me about mantises in china that grow to about 10'' tall and much more aggressive than the species in north america. So i would guess to truley see them in action you need to be in their natural habitat.

[yingching]

Stacey,
There was a pretty interesting show on Discovery Channel a few Months back called "Alien Insect-Praying Mantis". They talked alot about the diffferent species of Mantis, and how they were all similar but different. Anyway, the hightlight of the show was some never before caught on camera footage of Praying Mantis catching a Bird, Mouse, and a battle with a 10" snake. According to the show, the largest mantis (about 6") is capable of kiling up to a 10" snake.
Anyway, if you get a chance watch it. Perhaps Wong Long witnessed a few battles like these....

[Tainan Mantis]

One source of Wang Lang's history says the mantis killed a bird not a cicada.
Now, I no longer doubt it is possible.
I'll go and get that Discovery VCD this week.

[Syre]

If anyone knows how to get a copy of that Discovery show on mantises, please post the info here!

Thanks.

[ExitusDeorum]

It realt depends on the variety of mantis. The bog-standard american Mantis (Mantidosa Carolina) is really quite pathetic. If you want to see real insectoid action, get the original thing The Chinese Mantis (Tendosa Sinensis) - these babies grow anything up to 8 inches long!
Bird? Shmird! These guys could take out a 747 with no effort.

[yingching]

If you are unable to get a copy of it, e-mail me directly.

[TAO YIN]

I saw a mantis get eaten whole by a little lizard. And you guys are telling me a mantis killed a bird. I saw a mantis kill a lion and a tiger both at the same time. Was the bird a newborn?

[Syre]

yingching, I tried to email you to ask for info on the discovery video, but your email is blocked on the site.

How can I get in touch with you?

Thanks.

[yingching]

You can e-mail me at- RochesterKungFu@AOL.com

[ExitusDeorum]

Tao Yin - what kind of mantis was it? How old was it? What size lizard was it?
Just as in the world of Martial Arts don't judge the whole on one thing that you see. Just because you see a taekwondo yellow belt fumbling through his forms, don't go thinking you can go and whup the a$$ of some Jeet Kune Do black sash.
No offence intended, mate.
Peace.

[fiercest tiger]

what mantis can beat a bird, i would love to see this happen?

what type of bird was the mantis fighting exitus?:o

[EARTH DRAGON]

Although I have never seen the documentary It would not be hard to imagine a mantis hanging on a flower as a hummingbird came to eat nectar and the mantis snatching the bird up in thier forelegs....Just a thought..

[GeneChing]

Praying Mantis Seen Hunting Fish for the First Time (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/praying-mantis-seen-hunting-fish-first-time-180970376/)
The ravenous insect repeatedly returned to the hunting site, suggesting praying mantises may be capable of complex learning

https://thumbs-prod.si-cdn.com/6Phv3iQN2A-9pxMLT73wzEoA_8Y=/800x600/filters:no_upscale()/https://public-media.smithsonianmag.com/filer/0a/e5/0ae564ea-4f72-4d59-b654-04e369c40586/fishing-praying-mantis.jpg
R.I.P., guppy. (Rajesh Puttaswamaiah)
By Brigit Katz
SMITHSONIAN.COM
SEPTEMBER 21, 2018

One night in March of last year, a praying mantis crept onto a rooftop garden in India and perched on an artificial pond, waiting intently. When an unsuspecting guppy swam by, the insect snatched it up and gobbled it down—marking the first time that a praying mantis has been observed fishing for its food in the wild, reports Jake Buehler of National Geographic.

The unusual scene was observed by the conservationist Rajesh Puttaswamaiah, who witnessed the male giant Asian mantis (Hierodula tenuidentata) return to the rooftop garden on five consecutive nights. The stealthy critter would hang out on water lilies or water cabbage leaves until a guppy got close enough to grab. It ate up to two fish during each hunting session, and managed to catch a total of nine guppies. After the fifth night, the mantis stopped paying visits to the garden.

Puttaswamaiah, conservationist Nayak Manjunath and Roberto Battiston, an entomologist at Italy’s Musei del Canal di Brenta, describe this unprecedented hunting behavior in the Journal of Orthoptera Research. Mantids, they note in their new report, have been known to feast on small vertebrates like lizards, mice, snakes and turtles, but these encounters often take place in cages or as the result of other types of human interference. More typically, mantids will eat insects, especially fly-like ones.

Research has shown, however, that praying mantises can be crafty and aggressive hunters. A 2017 study found that praying mantises around the world are able to catch and eat small birds, most of them fast-moving hummingbirds. But even though the insects appear willing to chow down on most things they can grab, Puttaswamaiah and his co-authors were surprised that the rooftop praying mantis could see well enough to catch fish in the dark.

The structure of praying mantises eyes “clearly indicates that they have evolved to prey in daylight,” the researchers explain in a press release, yet the mantis described in the study always hunted at sunset or later. That the insect was able to see its prey in water, which presents another “visual barrier,” Battiston tells Buehler, is even more surprising. But he has a theory about how the mantis managed to catch the guppies.

“[A] mantid’s eye doesn’t work like ours,” he says. “They see movements better than shapes or colors. The [guppies] have a large tail they move like a flag while swimming, and it may have resembled to the mantid a strange bug scampering around.”

The guppy-gulping mantis also suggests that the insects may be capable of complex learning. The rooftop garden was full of many tasty insects for the critter to eat, but it chose to return, night after night, to the same hunting spot.

“This behavior sounds very much like a precise hunting strategy—not random choices,” Battiston tells Mindy Weisberger of Live Science.

Like many predators, praying mantises are capable of aversive learning, or learning from negative experiences; a recent study showed that the insects figure out to avoid prey that has been made artificially bitter. The rooftop mantis, according to the study authors, “suggests a further step to a more articulated cognitive process”: the ability to consider various environmental cues—the prey’s abundance at a particular site, their ease of capture, their nutritional value—and formulate new hunting strategies.

Of course, the researchers’ theories are based on the behavior of a single praying mantis, and further investigations are needed before any new conclusions about the insect’s hunting and cognitive abilities can be made. But the possible implications of the critter’s late-night snack fest is, at the very least, interesting food for thought.



I've heard of mantids killing birds before (http://www.kungfumagazine.com/forum/showthread.php?39207-preying-mantis-kills-humming-bird), but fishing is new to me.

[GeneChing]

Invade en masse. Numbers count.


WEIRD NEWS 01/09/2019 12:52 pm ET Updated 4 days ago
Over 100 Praying Mantises Take Over Home After Woman Buys Infested Christmas Tree (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/praying-mantis-infestation-christmas-tree_us_5c362864e4b070b69ae029ba)
Yes, Virginia, there are praying mantises in that Christmas tree.
By David Moy

Bah! Humbug! A Virginia woman’s Christmas tree left her a gift that keeps on giving ― but not in a good way.

Springfield veterinarian Molly Kreuze is bugged that more than 100 praying mantises have infested her home after hatching from an egg case hidden in her Christmas tree.

“Crawling on the walls, crawling on the ceilings. Just kind of moving,” she griped to DC station WJLA TV.

It’s possible the mantises are now praying in her bedroom, but that’s a scenario she doesn’t want to consider.

“I don’t want to think about that. It’s possible, but I don’t want to know,” she said, according to ABC News.

Although some people might simply vacuum up the bugs, Kreuze is trying to avoid that, preferring to scoop them up with an envelope and store them in a shoe box.

She is feeding fruit flies to her unwanted holiday guests while she tries to find them new homes.

“In my googling, I discovered people really like praying mantises,” she told WJLA. “They are useful, they eat other bugs, people use them for organic gardening.”

Still, the infestation has inspired her to get an artificial tree for next Christmas.

You can see the complete WJLA segment below:

You have to follow the link for that news vid.

[mooyingmantis]

A few years back I purchased an ootheca from a science supply store. We watched a few hundred hatch from it. They basically only ate each other and a cricket or two. I finally let them loose in my neighbor's garden and my backyard. They actually were pretty boring and didn't seem too bright. Disappointing! :(

[GeneChing]

In a flailing attempt to keep this subforum alive, I'm going to start posting articles on exotic mantids here. I see those fairly regularly on the newsfeeds. Mantids come in such variety.


Woman Finds An Incredible Bug Who's Almost Too Beautiful To Be Real (https://www.thedodo.com/in-the-wild/woman-finds-incredible-bug-flower-mantis)
"I was amazed."

BY STEPHEN MESSENGER
PUBLISHED ON 09/27/2019

The other day, Margaret Neville was strolling through the garden on her farm in South Africa when something remarkable caught her eye.

There, on a branch in her lavender bush, was an insect unlike any she’d seen before: “I was amazed at first sight,” Neville told The Dodo.

And it’s easy to see why.

https://assets3.thrillist.com/v1/image/2842712/size/tmg-article_tall.jpg
Margaret Neville

The beautiful bug almost looked like a delicate glass sculpture. Her wings of white and green were accentuated with an elegant swirl, while the rest of her body was adorned with tiny, purple flower-like structures.

Neville shared the photo with her friend, Kerri Martinaglia. She was equally impressed.

“When I saw her, I thought she was an exquisite work of art,” Martinaglia told The Dodo.

https://assets3.thrillist.com/v1/image/2842711/size/tmg-article_tall.jpg
Margaret Neville

Neville and Martinaglia came to learn that the insect she’d found was aptly called a “Flower Mantis,” a type of praying mantis perfectly suited to camouflaging themselves in floral settings.

And thanks to that trick, the mantis Neville happened upon was clearly thriving. Before placing her back in the lavender bush, Neville gave her a name: Miss Frilly Pants.

Here’s video of Miss Frilly Pants in action:
facebook vid (https://www.facebook.com/waterfallretreat/videos/947524142256141/)

“She has spent the entire month of September living on my lavender,” Neville said. “She is still there now.”

After Martinaglia shared photos of her online, the remarkable mantis has earned plenty of admirers from people stunned to learn such an animal is real. But not all of her new fans are human.

Recently, Neville spotted Miss Frilly in the company of a suitor:

https://assets3.thrillist.com/v1/image/2842713/size/tmg-article_tall.jpg
Margaret Neville

Though mantis relationships are notoriously short-lived (as are, in some cases, the males involved in them), with any luck, this one will result in many more Miss Frillys adding their beauty to the world.

And the prospect of that alone is enough to be grateful for:

“What a blessing,” Neville said.

[David Jamieson]

Avoid sex with the wife!

J/K

But dang, those mantis ladies are hardcore!

[GeneChing]

With winged legs, orchid mantis sets gliding record (https://www.science.org/content/article/winged-legs-orchid-mantis-sets-gliding-record)
Camouflaged like a flower, these predators also have a getaway trick
28 NOV 202311:30 AM ETBYERIK STOKSTAD
https://www.science.org/do/10.1126/science.zriz511/full/_20231128_on_mantis_orchid-1701460889487.jpg
CHIEN LEE/MINDEN PICTURES

The orchid mantis (Hymenopus coronatus) looks so much like a flower that you might be tempted to take a sniff. Now there’s another reason it’s exceptional. Researchers will report tomorrow in Current Biology that the insect’s petal-shaped legs allow it to glide 50% to 200% ****her than other invertebrates.

The orchid mantis (pictured) looks deceptively like the bloom of a moth orchid. In addition to having a pink and white body with just the right patterns, it will sway gently to mimic the effect of wind on the petals. When a prey insect buzzes by to look for nectar, the mantis rapidly strikes. For more than a century, this species and a few relatives have been iconic examples of animal mimicry.

After noticing that orchid mantises would jump vigorously away when startled, researchers wondered whether their petal-shaped legs might serve not just as camouflage, but also as wings. In profile, the legs are curved like a wing, and in experiments dropping nearly a dozen mantises from a crane, the researchers documented the insects flipping themselves right side up and then gliding for up to 8 meters.

The escape strategy is most useful for younger mantises; as they mature, they grow wings for powered flights. Who bothers to set up an experiment on mantises involving a crane?