Dixon Wragg
New member
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2008
- Messages
- 2
- Reaction score
- 0
I just joined yesterday. I'm new to most of this stuff, but am interested in nearly all the arts and sciences. I joined this group largely to get help with identifying a couple of specimens I've found.
Last fall I captured a mantis at my workplace (outside Cotati in northern California), and found it interesting. My local entomologist friend couldn't identify it, so I sent it to the Essig Entomological Museum at UC Berkeley and...they can't ID it either--partly because they have no mantis experts on their staff. Pretty exciting! If anyone wants to try IDing it, contact the museum's Cheryl Barr at [email protected] and ask to have a crack at the mantis Dixon Wragg sent her last fall. It's about 3 inches long and resembles a California mantid, Stagmomantis californica, except that it lacks the requisite abdominal banding and also lacks the wing markings. Maybe a new race of that species?
Also, a few weeks ago I captured a different kind of mantis at the same location. I think it's a female or a nymph because it lacks wings. It's less than 2 inches long, and straw-colored. Judging from pictures I've seen, it could be a European mantis (because of the black-circled white "underarm" markings), but is it possible that their range has reached this far west (a few miles from the Pacific)? Or perhaps she's an escapee from someone who was using her for garden pest control? I released her in my house a couple of weeks ago and haven't seen her since. I hope she's OK. If I can figure out how to post pictures, I'll post 3 photos of her in the photo section within a day or two...
Thanks everyone
Dixon
Last fall I captured a mantis at my workplace (outside Cotati in northern California), and found it interesting. My local entomologist friend couldn't identify it, so I sent it to the Essig Entomological Museum at UC Berkeley and...they can't ID it either--partly because they have no mantis experts on their staff. Pretty exciting! If anyone wants to try IDing it, contact the museum's Cheryl Barr at [email protected] and ask to have a crack at the mantis Dixon Wragg sent her last fall. It's about 3 inches long and resembles a California mantid, Stagmomantis californica, except that it lacks the requisite abdominal banding and also lacks the wing markings. Maybe a new race of that species?
Also, a few weeks ago I captured a different kind of mantis at the same location. I think it's a female or a nymph because it lacks wings. It's less than 2 inches long, and straw-colored. Judging from pictures I've seen, it could be a European mantis (because of the black-circled white "underarm" markings), but is it possible that their range has reached this far west (a few miles from the Pacific)? Or perhaps she's an escapee from someone who was using her for garden pest control? I released her in my house a couple of weeks ago and haven't seen her since. I hope she's OK. If I can figure out how to post pictures, I'll post 3 photos of her in the photo section within a day or two...
Thanks everyone
Dixon
Hi Dixon, she is probably the european, they are brought from nurserys and are pretty much all over now. She is probably on top of a window or somewhere like that, Welcome to the forum from OHIO!
