of course traits can be bred into any creature that reproduces sexually, that is the advantage of sexual reproduction itself, how do you think so many species of mantid evolved in the first place? honey bee's have been kept by humans for a loooong time, the monks and buckfast abbey have been selectively breeding them for years
http://perso.fundp.ac.be/~jvandyck/homage/...methBW50en.html
and yes thier not mantids, but they are insects, they have a different lifecycle but they still reproduce sexually, they still exchange dominent and recessive genes so change is still possible
however the time scale you would be looking at to get a particular trait out of mantids... welll look at how long it takes to perfect a breed of dog, i dont see anyone being that determined or ever keeping that many mantids in the first place
the issue isn't is it possible, more, why would anyone bother?
check this artical i spotted on the bbc website;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7296539.stm
and christian, i agree, sometimes generations of inbreeding can be a benifit to the species, like with communal spiders
http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc99/5_8_99/bob2.htm
of course sometimes it backfires for them and whole generations are wiped out, but it locks in certain traits
oh and finally... i think there is a max size for invertibrates anyway, i dont think an insect the size of the one in that picture would be able to lift its own body off the ground, maybe if it was aquatic? but i've never heard of an aquatic praying mantis lol but i believe there have been aquatic arthropods in the early chapters of earths life that were quite massive?
http://perso.fundp.ac.be/~jvandyck/homage/...methBW50en.html
and yes thier not mantids, but they are insects, they have a different lifecycle but they still reproduce sexually, they still exchange dominent and recessive genes so change is still possible
however the time scale you would be looking at to get a particular trait out of mantids... welll look at how long it takes to perfect a breed of dog, i dont see anyone being that determined or ever keeping that many mantids in the first place
the issue isn't is it possible, more, why would anyone bother?
check this artical i spotted on the bbc website;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7296539.stm
and christian, i agree, sometimes generations of inbreeding can be a benifit to the species, like with communal spiders
http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arc99/5_8_99/bob2.htm
of course sometimes it backfires for them and whole generations are wiped out, but it locks in certain traits
oh and finally... i think there is a max size for invertibrates anyway, i dont think an insect the size of the one in that picture would be able to lift its own body off the ground, maybe if it was aquatic? but i've never heard of an aquatic praying mantis lol but i believe there have been aquatic arthropods in the early chapters of earths life that were quite massive?
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