Category: Reproductive Biology

A praying mantis female deposits many eggs shortly after her mating. The eggs she lays may only be a handful or hundreds (300-400). The mother mantis covers her eggs with a thick substance that hardens rapidly to a consistency similar in texture to polystyrene using her special accessory glands. This egg case, also known as…

The life cycle of just about every insect begins with the egg stage and ends in adulthood. There are four life stages in an insect’s life cycle. If it completes all four stages of a life cycle the individual species is said to complete a metamorphosis stage. However, not every species undergoes a complete metamorphosis.…

Praying mantis lays a minimum of 100 eggs. All these eggs are hatched at once so the parents must have greater responsibility to feed young mantises immediately right? That isn’t quite true because the female mantis dies after laying eggs. The female mantis is known to produce 100 to 200 eggs sometimes even more than…

The mating behavior of a praying mantis in the wild has been the subject of longstanding debate since the second half of the 19th century yet no convincing studies came to the fore. However, lately scientists are beginning to take interest as to how mantids mate in the wild; what are the peak mating months…

Yes, praying mantis do lay eggs but their eggs do not resemble any bird’s or reptile’s eggs. The female mantis typically lays foamy case made up of frothy liquid encasing 100 to 200 eggs. The foamy case protects the eggs from wind and rain. Many other insects guard their eggs in pretty much the same…

Yes they probably do, particularly if the female produces eggs right before the frost. This behavior isn’t only observed in mantids in fact the death of a female soon after laying eggs is pretty common in the insect world. No wonder, praying mantis are pretty infamous for exhibiting some of the most bizarre behavioral adaptations.…