What are the data and characteristics of mantis?

As early as more than 2,000 years ago, it was said in "Zhuangzi's Human Life": "You don't know the husband mantis, but you are angry that his arm is rutted and you don't know his incompetence." Statement. Thus came the idiom "gladiator's arm is like a car", which is used to laugh at those who have more than one can chew.

In fact, in the insect world, mantis should be called a brave fighter. It is a carnivorous insect with a fierce and cruel disposition. Its shape is also very strange: its long neck has a triangular head that can rotate at 180 degrees, a pair of filiform tentacles on the head, and a pair of compound eyes composed of hundreds of single crystals, which are huge and developed and protrude outward. Objects moving in front of it can be detected by it as long as 0.0 1 s, so that it can observe all directions in time. Its chest is particularly long, accounting for half of its body length, and its front foot has sharp serrations, like a sickle, which is the main weapon to catch prey.

Contrary to our ancestors' contempt for mantis, the ancient Greeks believed that mantis had supernatural power and honored it as a "fortune teller". They believed that livestock would die of poisoning if they ate mantis, and people would be blind if they were stained with mantis brown saliva. In fact, these myths and superstitions all originated from the hunting posture of mantis. Because they stand still waiting for their prey, they always raise their heads, lift their front feet and fold them on their chests. That dignified and elegant behavior is like praying, so they are also called "prayer bugs".

In nature, mantis dressed in green camouflage is a master of mimicry. It is very good at disguising itself. It can avoid natural enemies and is not easy to be found when waiting or approaching prey. They often wander between the grass and the Woods. Although they move slowly, they are first-class ambushing hands. They generally don't actively chase their prey, but always pose as "prayers" and wait patiently for the arrival of their prey. Some will lie in leaves or flowers and pretend to be a leaf or a flower to lure insects into traps.

The action of mantis catching cicada is even more striking. When an insect flying between trees and flowers comes to mantis's eyes, its compound eyes and proprioceptors in the neck immediately report the shape, size, flying speed and direction of the insect to the brain headquarters, and issue an order to catch them. So, mantis quietly spread its wings sideways, and its four feet slowly walked towards the insects step by step. When it reached a place not far from the insect, it suddenly stood up, slammed its front foot in the direction of the insect's flight like a broadsword, and attacked it with lightning speed. It immediately captured the insect alive, whether it was cicada, moth, cricket, locust, fly, mosquito ... and instantly became its delicious meal.

However, mantis often only sees the interests in front and ignores the dangers behind. When they attack insects with lightning speed, they are often exposed, but they become the prey of birds, that is, people often say, "mantis catches cicada, yellowbird comes behind."

Mantis not only kills all kinds of insects, but also kills each other. When food is scarce, the larger mantis often eats the smaller one, so people often find some headless mantis bodies in the wild. What is particularly amazing is that when male mantis and female mantis copulate, the larger female mantis will eat her "husband" as food! More strangely, the male mantis has evolved a countermeasure, that is, even if the whole head is cut off by the female mantis during mating, it will not affect the continuation of mating and complete fertilization, because its reproductive hook remains in the female mantis, and the nerve center that controls the mating behavior of the male mantis is not in the brain, but in the thoracic ganglion and abdominal ganglion.

Why do female mantises eat the male mantis they mate with as food? This may be because the female mantis must consume a lot of physical strength in the process of mating, reproduction and spawning, so the male mantis during mating has become its most convenient food. Although this phenomenon seems very cruel and barbaric, it is in this way that the female mantis absorbs energy, thus successfully reproducing, while the male mantis, with the spirit of "dying for love", deserves to be the most loyal "gentleman" in the animal kingdom.

When laying eggs, the mother mantis first needs to find shelter from the wind and rain. While secreting a viscous liquid from the ovipositor tube at the end of her abdomen, she stirred the liquid one by one with two valves at the end, injected air, stirred the liquid into foam, and then began to lay eggs. Every egg is covered with foam. The foam quickly dries, forms a solid and becomes an egg sheath to protect its eggs from hatching smoothly. When the little mantis was born, except for its small body and no wings, the whole shape was very similar to their parents. Little mantis also feeds on insects. After eight or nine molts, it develops into an adult and then reproduces in the way of their parents.

Mantis belongs to Mantidae, a winged subclass. It is a medium to large insect with a triangular head and can move freely. The leg joints and tibial joints of the forefoot are prickly, and the tibial joints are sickle-shaped and often fold to the leg joints to form the forefoot that can catch prey; The anterior wing cortex is covered with wings, lacking the anterior domain, the posterior wing is membranous, and the gluteal domain is developed into a fan, which folds on the back at rest; Abdominal hypertrophy. Except in extremely cold regions, it is widely distributed all over the world, especially in tropical regions. There are about 1585 species known in the world. About 5 1 species is known in China. Among them, southern mantis, northern mantis, broad-axe mantis, Chinese mantis, European mantis and green-spotted mantis are important natural enemies of pests in agriculture, forests, fruit trees and ornamental plants in China. Mantis is very long, mostly green, but also brown or spotted. The compound eye was prominent, with 3 eyes in one eye. Chew the mouthparts, and the upper jaw is strong. Grasp the feet with the front feet, and the middle and rear feet are suitable for walking. Gradually pervert. Eggs are laid in egg sheaths, and there are 20 ~ 40 eggs in each egg sheath, arranged in 2 ~ 4 rows. Each female insect can produce 4 ~ 5 egg sheaths, which are hardened by foamy secretions and attached to branches, bark, walls and other objects. The newly hatched nymph is a "pre-nymph", and it will become an adult only after peeling it for 3 ~ 12 times. Generally 1 year 1 generation, some species parthenogenesis. Eating meat and hunting all kinds of insects and small animals can eliminate many pests in fields and forest areas, so it is beneficial. Sexual abuse and aggression, lack of food often lead to the phenomenon of swallowing snacks and females eating males. Individual species distributed in South America sometimes attack small animals such as birds, lizards or frogs. Mantis has protective color, and some are mimicry, which is similar to its environment, thus preying on a variety of pests.