Praying Mantis

• How does a praying mantis hunt? - http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/aprilholladay/2007-01-22-mantis-horizon_x.htm
• "With its excellent eyesight, patience and use of cryptic behavior, the mantis strikes with amazing speed at almost any animal its size, even small birds!" says Dan Feldman of the Colorado State University entomology department. "The mantid mantis uses two primary hunting methods," Feldman says. It usually waits "motionless" until prey "comes within strike range" or it will occasionally pursue, in fluid slow motion, its hapless target until it gets within range. The strike takes "30 to 50 thousandths of a second."
• Researchers have found praying mantis to eat twenty-one species of insects, turtles, mice, frogs, birds and newts
  • I've seen a mantis catch a second cricket in its left leg while still eating the first held in it's right leg. A mantis will completely devour a cricket, except for some wing pieces that it may drop.
  • Praying mantis eating hummingbirds
    • Best on mantids eating humming birds, still pictures and video link
    • Story copied from above link link
    • "I would have never ever believed that" - poor quality video - link
    • Including slow motion video, watch the feathers fly link
  • Praying mantis eating mouse link
• Advice about identification of species of mantids. and praying mantis sales scams - link
• Praying mantis in amber - link
• Ohio History Central article on preying mantises - http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=1101

• Praying mantis care sheet
• Entymology course paper - http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/Entomology/courses/en507/papers_1999/feldman.htm
• http://www.desertusa.com/mag00/dec/papr/mantis.html
• http://www.ca.uky.edu/entomology/entfacts/ef418.asp
• Silly article on how to keep a mantis without a cage - http://www.wikihow.com/Keep-a-Pet-Praying-Mantis-Without-a-Cage
• Myth about a law prohibiting killing of mantis - http://www.snopes.com/critters/wild/mantis2.asp
• http://www.buglogical.com/prayingMantis_control_aphids/prayingMantis.asp
• Ohio university - praying mantis fact sheet - http://ohioline.osu.edu/hyg-fact/2000/2154.html
• http://www.wonderclub.com/Wildlife/insectsandspiders/praying_mantis.htm
• http://www.enchantedlearning.com/subjects/insects/mantids/Prayingmantidprintout.shtml
• Several pages on mantis - http://prayingmantis.shawnolson.net/
• http://insected.arizona.edu/mantidinfo.htm
• Wikipedia mantis article - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantis

Videos:

• Female mantis eating male after mating - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYp_Xi4AtAQ
  • Female mantis - sexual predator? - http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/exchange/node/1801
• Girl eats praying mantis to get friends to go to church - http://www.break.com/index/bugchick.html
• Animal Planet - Mantis - Nature's perfect predator - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hGuallLPcM

Related:

• Circus in Prague with 30 foot tall giant praying mantis - link
• Praying mantis origami - http://dev.origami.com/images_pdf/mantis.pdf

Less related:

• Shyun Style Eight Step Preying Mantis Kung Fu - link

New product:

• Forget having a dog in your purse, so droll..... Try our new line of "Pocket Predators"! That's right, real meat eating insects and animals that fit in your pocket!

Other keywords:

• Preying mantis
• mantid