This hatching happened last July near my front walk. It's the second time I've been lucky enough to spot an egg case hatching. I've never seen the event from start to finish so I don't know how long it took for all those itty bitty mantises to crawl out of the tiny hole in the bottom of the pod, drop or crawl into that big mass, then either drop to the ground and walk or climb away. But it didn't take long. Each one of those "bananas" hanging from the bunch was about an inch or less long. A perfect little mantis ready to fend for itself. I wonder how many of them survived?
Bad close-up. Next year I hope to get better shots.
Now I have two more egg cases, safely (I hope) on my front porch, and ready to hatch in the summer.
3 comments:
To my knowledge, I've never seen a praying mantis. That is a LOT of them! Do they eat other bugs or just each their mates?
Praying mantises are one of the few bugs I really love. Not that I want to have them as pets but this must have been fascinating to watch. They eat bugs Margaret! Bad bugs! I like to think they eat spiders but I don't know...
Woooow! I've never seen a mantis nest. This is amazing!
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