Narrow-winged Mantis

For Throwback Thursday, here's a mantis I've talked about but haven't shown before. Here's what is believed to be a Narrow-winged Mantis, a fairly close relative of the Chinese Mantis. And yes, it looks like a Monarch butterfly was on the menu this day. While Monarch butterflies absorb some of the toxins in the milkweed plants they ate as caterpillars, making them toxic to most predators, but some mantises will prey upon them. There are lots of ideas about this:

  • When they feed on young caterpillars, the caterpillars may not have eaten enough milkweed to be poisonous enough to bother the mantis.
  • Mantises generally avoid eating the guts of the butterflies. Though the Monarch's entire body is generally considered poisonous, some poisons are most prevalent in the gut. It's possible that the mantises avoid the poisons they're most sensitive to by throwing the guts away.
  • I'm not sure that all species of mantis will eat Monarchs. Most sources indicate the Chinese Mantis will prey on them, while other sources are a bit more vague. If my identification is correct, it looks like we can add the Narrow-winged Mantis to the list of Monarch predators. (Given Narrow-winged and Chinese Mantises look pretty similar and are in the same genus, it wouldn't be all that surprising if they both handle Monarchs the same way.)
  • Arthropods may generally be less sensitive to the toxins in Monarchs. Some sources say that spiders and wasps will also prey on Monarchs.
Why am I calling this a Narrow-winged Mantis? Mostly because 1 of the people on iNaturalist thought they could see orange spots (mostly obscured) on the inside of 1 of the front legs, a field mark for the Narrow-winged Mantis.

October 7, 2018 at Duke Farms
Photo 26250867, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)


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