Praying Mantis!

Our afternoon hike on this day took us up into the local game land. On our way back down the hill, my husband spotted a praying mantis looking out at us through the fence, and the light was right on it, so it was a perfect opportunity to blip it!

A friend informs me that this is a female. Wikipedia says, "The abdomen of all mantises consists of ten tergites with a corresponding set of nine sternites visible in males and seven visible in females." So there you have it.

I laughed when I saw this bug because, posing as it was from behind the fence, it almost looked like it was in jail! And so the song to accompany this insect blip is from the film O Brother, Where Art Thou? And so I present: the Soggy Bottom Boys, with In the Jailhouse Now.