Mr. or Mrs. Mantis

It's interesting how you stumble upon a Praying Mantis from time to time in the middle of the summer. It's always a chance encounter. Although they must be relatively plentiful, I doubt that anyone ever set out to find one and was successful in any reasonable amount of time. Looking so much like your surroundings tends to buy that sort of privacy.

The individual pictured here must have figured that he/she was sufficiently similar in appearance to a Britax car seat to go unnoticed as I strapped it into the car. I figure it was a "use what you have available" last-ditch effort. It didn't work. The consequence for not blending well on a blue and white background was to spend 15 minutes helping me work on my macro photography.

Thank you for your time, my little green friend. I hope you have better luck blending into the leaves on the maple tree in the back yard.