Not a Carolina Mantis

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my apartment door.

Okay, I have to confess that my hearing is not good enough to have heard this guy "tapping, gently rapping" on my door. It wasn't until I went outside that I noticed my visitor. 

Probably because of the light in the doorway, my apartment door is a fairly popular spot for moths, mayflies, and various other nocturnal insects. This is bound to attract predators like the (relatively) large mantises down to small jumping spiders. I suspect this fella had staked out the area in hopes of making a meal of my smaller arthropod visitors.

When trying to get an ID, I initially went with iNaturalist's 1st suggestion, a Carolina Mantis. But then I read that the wings of the Carolina Mantis only go about 2/3 of the way down its abdomen, which is obviously not the case with this individual.

That leaves the 3 usual suspects:

  • European Mantis - Generally bigger than the Carolinas, but generally smaller than the Chinese or Narrow-winged. They're supposed to have either a black or an black-around-white circle in the inside of their front legs.
  • Chinese Mantis - Co-biggest of the mantises likely to be in my area, the Chinese Mantis is supposed to have yellow spots on the inside of its front legs.
  • Narrow-winged Mantis - The other co-biggest mantis. They're similar enough to the Chinese Mantis that it's no surprise they're related. They're supposed to have orange spots on the inside of their front legs.

Unfortunately mantises naturally keep their front legs fairly close together, at least when they're at rest, making it difficult to "spot the spots". One reason I'm suspicious it's in the tenodera genus is because the egg casings (oothecae, pronounced like OH-uh-THEE-kuh) look more like that of the Chinese/Narrow-winged Mantises.

September 4, 2022 at Sunny Slope Road
Photo 238964960, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Northern Watersnake

Image
This April I went to Great Swamp National Wildlife Refuge with the hope (among other hopes) of seeing the Northern Watersnakes during mating season. There were 2 problems with this: I think it was slightly late in the season for this. The boardwalk trail where I had seen them in the past was partially closed due to repairs. So although I didn't see any of the 2+ intertwined snakes that I'd seen in the past, but there were still Northern Watersnakes warming themselves in the sun: April 13, 2023 at Great Swamp Photo 272117862, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) And here's another one coming out of the water. April 13, 2023 at Great Swamp Photo 272119139, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)
Read more

Female Brown-headed Cowbird

Image
Like quite a few birds, this bird is easier to identify when spotted with her significant other ; she's a Brown-headed Cowbird . Due to their tendency to be monogamous plus plain old birds-of-a-feather behavior, I usually see them with prominently brown-headed males around, greatly improving my confidence in IDing them. My understanding is that Brown-headed Cowbirds are the only obligate brood parasites in my area. Obligate brood parasites have essentially lost all their parenting skills, and thus if they were ever unable to fool other birds into raising their young, they would (almost certainly) go extinct [1]. There are, however, other brood parasites in New Jersey. These are called facultative brood parasites, and these birds will usually raise their own offspring, but will also engage in brood parasitism. (Exactly when birds perform facultative brood parasitism seems variable; one source said it occurred when resources were scarce while another said it occurred when resource
Read more

Rooftop Turkey Vultures

Image
I met these Turkey Vultures by just walking out of my apartment. (I theoretically could have gotten a picture without going outside, but that extra layer of glass can degrade picture quality a little.) Although they don't show up on these rooftops daily, they're not an uncommon visitor to my apartment complex. Similar to this spot of the woods , I wouldn't expect this to be a great place to find carcasses. I'm thinking they're here mostly because: They don't have to worry much about predators up there. They get a pretty good view of the area in case something should happen to succumb. (This apartment was near the top of a hill, providing a better view than most of the other apartments.) Since this picture was from February, it's probably a slightly warmer spot, especially near those furnace vent pipes. Although these are Turkey Vultures, it's also not unusual to see Black Vultures up there too. February 28, 2023 at Finderne Photo 264703396, (c) jpviole
Read more