I used to love the praying mantis but when I witnessed one capture an adult monarch that I was watching and kill it; they lost my favor.

Yeah, they get to be pretty big sometimes too. Dad and Uncle swear they say one eating a hummingbird years ago at the ranch. I also saw some photos on the internet about that. Scary!!!

Yes...someone on Davesgarden.com had posted a picture of a PM spearing a hummingbird.

I accidentally got pinched by a PM. I was pulling up some weeds that were in and around a bed that had Agastaches in it and all of a sudden, I got pinched!

Oh my gosh! I too like mantids, but if it will interfere with the butterflies, I think maybe I wont buy eggs next year. I never thought about them enjoying a meal of BF. I don't know why I never thought of it.. I have seen the videos of them eating hummers. Sometimes (many times) I am so slow to catch on. (Then other times I never do catch on, I just go about my merry way).

Maybe the mantis thought your finger was a nice worm Marilyn, and he gave you a taste!

I'd like to move the PM to another part of the yard when I see them, but I don't how and I'm scared to get pinched! I don't want them eating Hummers and BF's.

Maybe some gloved hands, and just gently scoop them up? Or a box of some sort with a piece of paper to shoo it into the box?

The last time I saw one here about a year ago, I got real close to look at it... well, that "not right" movement of it's head and those eyes glancing over at me told me to slowly back away... It reminded me a little of a cat that was ready to pounce.

Yes, I'll have to get it in a box (or something like that), so it won't get away from me.

I know they don't like water on them. When I'm watering my containers and plants in the ground, they always move away from the water and look at me with those beady little eyes. They always seem to watch me (closely) when I watering, turning their head and eyes at me.

Oh no!!

A couple weeks ago, I came across a huge PM as I was cleaning up the garden and thought nothing of it. Now, as I was working in the other end of the garden, I found all this death and destruction under the Joe Pye weed ~ piles of wings.


If I find that little $@% I shall transport him far, far away!

Oh no!

Oh no!

Wow Moby! You need to go out with a camera and stake out the JPyeweed. I bet you will see him there somewhere near the blooms where butterflies light. Or it could be a lizard doing it. Either way that is a feeding point.

I was just thinking..... I have Joe Pye Weed also. My variety is 'Little Joe' and I better look around my planting, just in case. Hope I don't find anything.

I have lizards that are on the milkweed every morning when I go in the garden, just waiting for butterflies or other insects. But I also have the mantis, large and small, they just hide good. It always startles me when they are close and move. I don't have JoePye, but all of the predators seem to know where the bfs feed.

No lizards here, thankfully. That's one good thing about winters cold enough to freeze most flying pests. I assumed it was birds, initially, but the wings weren't munched or damaged in any way. Surely only mantids would be evil enough to leave perfect little wings all over.

Now where is my battery-operated fly zapper....? (I'm not one of those nice 'live and let live' people)

PREY-ing Mantis...that's what they DO everyday, anything they can catch. I've seen them station themselves at night next to a bright deck light...catching prey after prey! But finding the sweet little hummingbird in one's clutches...that was IT for me. No more Ms. Nice to PM here!

LindaTX8 said:PREY-ing Mantis...that's what they DO everyday, anything they can catch. I've seen them station themselves at night next to a bright deck light...catching prey after prey! But finding the sweet little hummingbird in one's clutches...that was IT for me. No more Ms. Nice to PM here!

That would seriously challenge my "live and let live" philosophy

There are plenty of bad bugs they could eat ~ grasshoppers, moths, bud worms etc.. But I draw the line at eating the pretty things that do nothing but sip nectar.

I located 2 BIG mantids.... they've now been reduced to compost fodder. >:)