On my way into the office this morning, I saw a spider web in the bushes. It caught my eye because it was the smallest web I’d ever seen with stabilimenta. I searched a bit for its owner with no luck, and just before I went inside I noticed I was being watched:
Aren’t praying mantises cool? This is a little one, under an inch long. I’m pleased the photo came out as well as it did.
What’s with all of the bug photos? Heh. I’d give some thought to a regular insect/arachnid feature a la Saintseester’s F-F-Friday, but I have a feeling it’d be a real slog in the winter.
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My current favorite bugs are walking sticks. Those are the end-all of cool looking creatures.
If there are alien species among us, praying mantises have to be one of them. There was a documentary about these predatory bugs on Discovery (or Science, or Learning, or History, or Animal Planet, they rotate the piddly number of shows they have amongst each other, have the same ownership–a right-wing religious nut, thus the plethora of “archeological” shows about Jesus).
One scene actually showed a praying mantis catching and eating a hummingbird. Anything which eats hummingbirds is evil. Sez me.
I think praying mantis’ are so cool.