The color is protective , very variable, ranging from green or yellow to brown-gray or dark brown. Pronotum of moderate length, forelegs grasping, in addition to obtaining food, are also used for movement. Hind legs running. The wings are well developed both in the male and in the female (although the females, due to their impressive size, fly very poorly and reluctantly). The abdomen is ovoid, rather long.
Mantis grasping legs: shin and thigh spikes visible
Common Mantis is a typical ambush predator mimicking the surrounding plants. Lurking the victim, he is inactive, when he appears within reach, captures with his front grasping legs, holding him between the spiked thigh and lower leg.
His waiting position, which is characteristic, generally speaking, of all real praying mantises , prompted Karl Linnaeus to give him the binomial name Mantis religiosa : μάντις in Greek means “ prophet ”, “forecaster”, priest, and religiosa from Latin - “religious”, since in this position the insect looks like a man with his hands folded in prayer .
Unlike males that feed on fairly small insects, larger and heavier females can attack insects of the same, and sometimes larger size, than themselves. In addition, praying mantises can eat their own cubs if they did not have time to take shelter after hatching from an egg [5] .
Exposure to sex hormones leads to increased aggressiveness in behavior. At this time, cases of cannibalism are common between females. One of the most famous features of the common mantis is the devouring of a male by a female after or even during mating . However, in most cases, mating occurs normally, and the female eats the male only after mating, and then only in 50% of cases. In fact, the female eats the male because of the high need for protein in the early stages of egg development. Like all praying mantises, the common praying mantis lays eggs in ooteks .
European mantis is common in southern Europe from Portugal to Turkey and Ukraine . Also found on many islands of the Mediterranean Sea ( Balearic , Corsica , Sardinia , Sicily , Malta , Aegean islands , Cyprus ), in Egypt and Sudan , in the Middle East from Israel to Iran , on the Arabian Peninsula . Numerous species throughout the south of Russia to the Far East [6] . Also probably introduced to New Guinea . Introduced to the east of the United States in the 1890s , from where it populated the whole country, as well as the south of Canada . At the beginning of the XXI century found in Costa Rica . There are also conflicting accounts of the findings of the common mantis in Bolivia , Jamaica and Australia [7] .
In Europe, the northern border of the species distribution passes along the line of the 50th parallel of northern latitude, through countries and regions such as France , Belgium , southern Germany , Tyrol , Austria , Czech Republic , Slovakia , southern Poland , the forest-steppe of Ukraine, southern Russia. However, at the end of the 20th century , the range began to expand slightly to the north. As of 2012, the common mantis has become numerous in northern Germany, has appeared in Belarus and Latvia [8] .
There are 12 subspecies [9] :
- M. r. beybienkoi ( Bazyluk 1960)
- M. r. caucasica ( Lindt , 1974)
- M. r. eichleri (Bazyluk 1960)
- M. r. inornata ( Werner , 1930)
- M. r. langoalata (Lindt, 1974)
- M. r. latinota (Lindt, 1974)
- M. r. macedonica ( Karaman , 1961)
- M. r. major ( Gerstaecker , 1873)
- M. r. polonica (Bazyluk, 1960)
- M. r. religiosa ( Linnaeus , 1758)
- M. r. siedleckii (Bazyluk 1960)
- M. r. sinica (Bazyluk 1960)
