Praying Mantis Animal Study & Lapbook

Cover Page	Defense Matchbook	Lifecycle Wheel
Anatomy Shutterfold	Diet Matchbook	Map Shutterfold
Body Parts Layer	Fun Fact Octagons	Predators Matchbook
Book Log Fan	Hunting Strategies Matchbook	Vocabulary Words Fan
Classification Flap	Largest & Smallest Twice Folded	Where Do Mantises Live? Book
Metamorphosis

Classification

There are about 2,200 kinds of praying mantises.

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Anthropoda

Class: Insecta

Subclass: Pterygota

Infraclass: Neoptera

Superorder: Dictyoptera

Order: Mantodea

Relatives

Termites and cockroaches are closely related to mantises.

Where Are they Found?

Mantises are found in temperate, tropical, and subtropical regions. They live on every continent except Antarctica.

Where Do They Live?

Praying mantises do not build homes, such as nests or hives, the way some other insects do. Instead, they live in trees, shrubs, flowers, or grass. Mantises find homes where they can hide or camouflage themselves. For example, the dead-leaf mantis looks like dried, crumpled leaves which help it blend in with the rotting leaves that are its home.

Most adult mantises live their whole lives in one place. They tend to stay in one or two bushes or trees throughout their whole lives.

Anatomy

Like other insects, a praying mantis’ body is divided into three parts (head, thorax, and abdomen), six legs and two large compound eyes.

Most mantises are brown or green but some are white, pink, or purple.

1. Exoskeleton
It has a long body with a tough outer shell called an exoskeleton. If you touch a mantis, the exoskeleton makes its body feel like tough plastic. This exoskeleton covers its entire body, even its eyes. It is made up of separate plates connected by stretchy tissue and that lets the mantis bend and move. The exoskeleton protects the mantis’ body like a suit of armor. And, like a suit of armor, it doesn’t grow so a mantis has to molt, or shed, its exoskeleton when it becomes too tight for its growing body.

2. Head and Eyes
The mantis has a triangle-shaped head with sharp mouthparts made for chewing live prey. Its two long, thin antennae, or feelers, help it find food. It often nods and tilts its head from side to side to size up its potential prey and to estimate the distance for its attack. It can even turn its head up to 300 degrees, or almost a full circle, so it can easily spot predators or prey from as far away as sixty feet. This is something that no other insect can do! A praying mantis has two large compound eyes on its head which gives it excellent eyesight. Each eye is made up of hundreds of lenses. What a praying mantis sees with its eyes is like someone watching hundreds of TVs all at once from the same channel. Along with its compound eyes, a mantis also has three simple eyes that are arranged in a triangle between its antennae. Insect scientists, also called entomologists, think these simple eyes can tell the difference between light and dark while the compound eyes see images and colors.

3. Legs
The mantis has three pairs of jointed legs. The front pair has spines and hooks that are used to catch and hold its prey. It usually folds these legs as if it were saying its prayers. This is why people call it a “praying mantis”. These legs, along with its four wings, are attached to its thorax.

4. Ear
Many kinds of mantises also have a slit on the underside of their thorax. This slit serves as their ear. Scientists think that mantises are the only animals with just one ear! This ear is especially good at detecting a bat’s sonar clicks.

Smallest and Largest

Most mantises grow to between two and fives inches but some are much smaller and others are much larger.

The Bolbe pygmaea mantis is one of the smallest at less than one inch long while the Malaysian mantis is one of the largest at ten inches.

They Are Hunters

Mantises hardly ever stalk their prey. Instead, they are ambush hunters. This means that they remain perfectly still, waiting and watching for their prey to come by. Once an insect or other tasty animal is close enough to the mantis, it will grab the animal with its spiny front legs and bite the back of its neck to kill it. The mantis’ lightning-fast attacks are so fast that, often, human eyes cannot detect them.

A praying mantis will only eat live prey. If it drops part of the prey it’s eating, like a wing or leg, the mantis will not pick it up. After it finishes eating, the mantis will groom itself like a cat. First, it cleans its front legs. Then, it uses them to clean every part of its head: eyes, feelers, everything.

What They Like to Eat

Mantises mainly eat insects like grasshoppers, butterflies, moths, flies, aphids, bees, wasps, beetles, and caterpillars but some of the larger ones will also eat small tree frogs, soft shell turtles, lizards, small mammals like mice, and even hummingbirds!

Their Predators

Baby mantises like to be eaten by lizards, spiders, frogs, ants, and … even other baby mantises!

Adult praying mantises are eaten mainly by birds, bats, larger spiders, and snakes.

Defenses

Praying mantises have various ways of protecting themselves from their predators.

1. Camouflage

One way is by using camouflage. This means that they can hide by blending in with their surroundings. Some mantises look like green twigs. Others look like dead leaves. Still others look like colorful tropical flowers. Some mantises can even change color.

2. Fly Away
If camouflage doesn’t work and a predator spots a praying mantis, the mantis will fly away or drop to the ground in a spiral pattern.

3. Fearsome Behavior
If there’s no possibility of flying away from a predator, the mantis might face that predator, rear up, and open its jaws. It may also raise its front legs and make a hissing sound by rattling its wings to try to scare the predator away. It may even lunge, or rush forward, at a predator, even if that animal is much larger than itself.

4. Markings that Confuse
Another way that some praying mantises defend themselves is by having markings on its body that can confuse predators. Several types of mantises have big spots on their backs which look like large eyes when the mantis spreads its wings. These “eyes” can surprise a predator which gives the mantis the opportunity to make a quick getaway.

Reproduction and Lifecycle

The three growth stages (egg, nymph, and adult) the mantis goes through are known as simple metamorphosis. They usually live for three to nine months.

1. Egg Stage
Around late summer, the abdomen of the female mantis is full of eggs. When she’s ready to find a mate to fertilize her eggs, she gives off a chemical called a pheromone. It’s like a perfume and, when a male mantis senses it with his antennae, he will know that the female mantis will welcome him. Once he knows it’s safe to approach her, he performs a little dance where he spreads his wings and curls his abdomen to get her attention. If the female likes what she sees, she will hold out her front legs which scientists think is a signal to let the male know that she will not hurt him. This is important because some female mantises will bite the head off the male if he gets too close and she’s not ready to mate. By the way, mantises can live for days without their heads!

About nine days after the mantises mate, the female will search for a stem or branch well above the ground to protect her eggs from predators. Once she finds the perfect spot, she hangs upside down from the branch and white foam that looks like whipped cream and made of protein starts to flow out from her ovipositor which is located at the very end of her abdomen. Her abdomen then moves in circles to form an egg case, called an ootheca, out of the foam. Then, she quickly lays her 50-300 eggs in this foam before it hardens. The hardened egg case is about the size and color of a walnut. This case serves as a safe home for her eggs. It can survive wind, snow, and rain. It also keeps out egg-eating enemies like ants and spiders. The female mantis makes several eggs cases before winter comes. Once she has laid her eggs, the female mantis’ job is done. She will never meet or raise her young. In fact, she will not live much longer after she’s finished making her last egg case.

2. Nymph Stage
In the spring, the days warm up which is the signal for baby mantises to push through slits located at the bottom of the egg case. These young mantises are called nymphs or mantids. They are no bigger than a mosquito. They look like tiny adult mantises but are the color of honey and have no wings. Once they’ve pushed out of the egg sac, the nymphs dangle upside down from thin threads then drop to the ground and run for shelter before any predators can spot them. Soon after, they shed their exoskeletons for the first time in order to grow. This is called molting. A nymph molts by hanging upside down from a plant stem. Its skin splits open and the nymph wiggles out of it. A nymph goes through six to ten molts, becoming larger each time, until it’s fully grown. The last time it molts, it will finally have fully formed wings. A young mantis is born knowing how to survive. Its front legs are ready to catch and hold prey. Its sharp mouth parts are ready to bite and chew. Before its first day is over, some nymphs will even eat their brothers and sisters if they’re hungry enough!

3. Adult Age
Despite its strong survival skills, many nymphs get eaten by predators like larger insects, spiders, and birds while others drown in spring rains. The nymphs who do manage to survive will reach adulthood in late summer when they will begin to look for mates to start the life cycle all over again.

Vocabulary Words

Abdomen – the large read section of an insect’s body.

Ambush – to wait quietly then attack suddenly.

Arthropod – an animal that has an exoskeleton instead of bones inside its body.

Camouflage – any disguise that hides or protects.

Compound eye – eye that has many lenses.

Entomologist – a scientists who studies insects.

Exoskeleton – The hard outer shell of an insect’s body.

Feelers – rod-like organs on an insect’s head which they use to smell and feel.

Lunge – to rush forward.

Mantid – a young praying mantis.

Metamorphosis – change in form that some insects go through during their natural development.