The New Zealand Praying Mantis

The other day I found a Praying Mantis inside the protective netting for the Monarch Butterfly's and I have since been told that they will eat the small caterpillars so the "Cage" has been zipped up again.

Today there were a pair of Mantis on the cage and I assume they were mating and having been told that the female will remove the head of the male after mating I was keeping an eye on them.
Nothing  happened!
A little research was called for and the pair that I found are native Kiwi Mantis who don't take part in cannibalism they are identifiable by the purple dot on the inside of their front legs.
The other species here in NZ is the South African Mantis which is forcing the Kiwi out and they are cannibalistic so the males do not survive.

It was jabs day today having out fifth Covid jab and the current Flu jab and as we have visited the UK, in many crowded places, Wales, Vancouver, Darwin, Sydney and multiple places in Japan without getting so much as a sniffle I'll take whatever protection is going to keep travelling.

Kasper has been reluctant to go out and if he was taken out he wouldn't get out of the car but today I encouraged him and I think after hurting his leg he had just lost confidence so we are building that back up.