Male and female mantids

[mantidsandgeckos]

Why dont male mantids have as much colour on their wings as females?

 

[Giosan]

What species do you mean?

All species I breed have basically the same colors - both male and female.

 

[The_Asa]

Are you talking about the texicorns? If so, that's just a trait.

 

[mantidsandgeckos]

No, i mean the inner wings.Male PO inner wings are colourless while females inner wings are yellow.

 

[collinchang635]

Are all mantids like that or just P.O.?

 

[The_Asa]

Either way, it's kind of an unanswerable question. The only thing I can come up with is that the female has flashier colors to attract the male.

 

[idolomantis]

depends on the sp.

my male religiosa was more colorfull then my female.

 

[Birdfly]

I would have said there is no need for coloured underwings as they are not seen normally, so there is no need to colour them.

Also they are usually mostly exposed during flight so transparency might be better there too, making less to easily see for a potential predator ?

Some species/sexes do have coloured hind wings, they might or might not fly as much or at all (because there females) and or use them better as a defence in diematic display, eye spots, bright warning colours

 

[chun]

A mantid male's sole purpose in life is to mate with as many females as possible, as male to male competition (sexual selection) is absent in mantids, there's no point in wasting precious limited energy resources on expensive ornaments such as those seen in species with high male to male competition for females eg some beetles or stalked eyed flies. As a male's life span is usually short, natural selection would have selected individuals/genes which spends more energy on increasing reproductive success than maled which invest too much energy in colourful wings for example.