Springbok mantis
The springbok mantis is a slim praying mantis, green or brown, that hides under leaves. It holds its spiky front legs folded up, ready to grab a passing bug. Some have pretty green or bright yellow back wings.
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Fun facts
Its eggs sit in a soft, creamy-brown egg case with a little handle on the end.
The egg cases are so tough that they survive cold winters, even in the mountains of New Zealand.
A female can have babies even without a male.
The babies hatch slowly, some weeks or even a whole season after their brothers and sisters.
In New Zealand it was first found in 1978 by a schoolboy in his own garden in Auckland.
Most asked questions about Springbok mantis
?Is the springbok mantis dangerous?
No. It cannot hurt people. It only hunts insects.
?How big is the springbok mantis?
Grown-ups are about 3 to 6 centimetres long. The males are smaller and thinner than the females.
?Where does the springbok mantis come from?
From southern Africa. People carried its egg cases by accident to New Zealand and other places.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Miomantis caffra
- Group
- Mantises
- Classification
- Insecta > Mantodea
- Lives on
- Africa, Australia and Oceania, Europe, North America
- Also known as
- South African praying mantis
Where the facts come from
- Miomantis caffra (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Bryce McQuillan. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at hello@bugwiki.app and we will fix it.
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