Thursday, June 9, 2011

Praying Mantis Nymph on Rose of Sharon


This is probably a baby Stagmomantis californica, but I'm not sure. It's so tiny, as you can see — the size of my fingertip (about a half inch). The thing that's confusing me is that I put out two store-bought oothecae (egg cases), which looked like this, but I have seen ones like this around the yard (active or old, I can't tell). The nearest one to the mantis's current location on the Rose of Sharon is the store bought ootheca that I put in the Pygmy Date Palm near the pond. Further, it's not clear to me which kind of mantis makes what case.

Oh, I'm just very happy to have mantises! That's the bottom line. Period.

2 comments:

  1. hey:) thanks for swinging by my old blog! i've taken a bit of a break lately; but hope to conitune blogging in the near future at my current site (being moved over)


    love your pic!

    melinda

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