Praying Mantis Devours Hummingbird in Shocking Photo

National Geographic ^ | JUNE 16, 2017 | Shaena Montanari

[Bratch]

They used to be bigger.

[tet68]

Do not even talk about Mantis sex...
You’ll lose your head.

[CJ Wolf]

[Reily]

I know inured to practice Mantis-Style Kung Fu.😀

[Carthego delenda est]

“I have beheaded a few standing on my bird feeder”

Do you like to dress up as a mantis too, while standing there on your bird feeder beheading hummingbirds?

(I couldn’t resist)

[georgiegirl]

I have seen this with my own eyes a few years ago right in my garden—unfortunately, before I had a digital camera.

[Chickensoup]

“I have beheaded a few standing on my bird feeder”

Do you like to dress up as a mantis too, while standing there on your bird feeder beheading hummingbirds?

(I couldn’t resist)

_____________________

No he dresses as a Islamic and uses a sword. after dressing the mantis in orange.

[onedoug]

I thought someone would post that.

[Don W]

Here on Van Isle I have lots of Anna’s, a couple of Calliopes, but that’s about it.

Several of the Anna’s overwinter here. It’s really neat to have a hummer coming up to the feeder when there is 3” of snow on the ground.

[Tijeras_Slim]

They’re fine brave little birds. I’ve been able to get them to land on my finger occasionally.

[heartwood]

That’s funny. I have Japanese beetles and praying mantises and the mantises don’t touch the beetles. I tried to tease a mantis into eating a beetle - took about five minutes before the mantis speared it - then it tasted it and frantically shook it off its claw - yuck! yuck! yuck!

I knock the beetles into water and then crush them. For a few days the ants clean up the beetles and then they get sick of them and leave them alone.

At the end of the season when the mantises are big enough to take a hummingbird I transport them away from the garden - but they have wings in that last molt.

[boomop1]

too funny.

[Godebert]

That first Mantis looks like he is mimicking a flower to fool his prey. Cool.

[Sgt_Schultze]

Good eye. That is an orchid mantis. Google that up and search images to see an amazing array. Too bad they aren’t native to the US.

[jmacusa]

Out here the mantis's eat them. They eat just about everything. Caterpillars seem to be their favorite. But we do have hummingbirds here. One little guy has been living in a tree across the street from us for years. He comes back year after year and loves my wife's Trumpet flowers. He seems to steer clear of the mantis. Seems also to love driving my cats nuts by buzzing our big picture window in the living room whenever they're sitting in it!

[Vendome]

Bruce Lee would beat his azz...

[Mean Daddy]

One day I saw a hummer hanging upside down off a branch. Went out to check and a praying mantis had it upside down. My feeders were hanging off of wood planks and had them hanging off the feeders like the photos. Got rid of the wood planks and haven’t had a problem since.

[Tilted Irish Kilt]

Ping - regarding recent gardening thread on hummingbirds

[FreedomStar3028]

I used to catch these all the time in Oregon.

I haven’t actually seen one in years.

Was wondering if they died off in the area. I used to see them all the time.

[DUMBGRUNT]

One of the buildings where I worked, BP Campus Naperville, Il, attracted hundreds of mantises. IIRC in late summer.

Nothing unusual in the building, pilot plants for the oil industry. Many buildings like it, but they only went to the one building?