This praying mantis is one persistent bug. It just keeps hanging around.
"I'm hanging in there!"
Yesterday it got back on top of the feeder and creeping closer to the hummingbirds whenever it could.
Closer.... closer....
The hummingbirds are certainly aware of the praying mantis, and buzz bomb it from time to time. It no longer sits passive, but tries to fight back. . .
.
I don't think this praying mantis is big enough to actually hold onto a hummingbird if it caught it. But I may have to think about relocating it if this continues.
. . . and if that isn't enough predators on the farm, there was a hawk hiding behind a post a few feet away from the feeder.
"You might not see me, but I'm waiting for a meal!"
Gee whiz, you'd think we were in the jungle with all this predator drama!
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My, you do have a predator convention going on.
Here’s the link the the ‘mantis eats hummingbird’ story.
http://www.birdwatchersdigest.com/site/backyardbirds/hummingbirds/mantis-hummer.aspx
Wow, if I hadn’t already re-located the praying mantis, I’d have run right out and done it after reading that story! I never thought about them impaling the hummingbird through the chest using their foreleg as a spear. Yikes! Well, I moved the praying mantis already many feet away into a lush jungle of trumpet vine, so hopefully he will be happy, and now don’t have to worry about him getting the hummers at the feeder.
Mantises fly like grasshoppers, many football fields when they feel like it. They keep great fan-wings folded up underneath wing-cases in back. Moving it five feet is not going to dissuade it.
I don’t know if they’re smart enough to remember their surroundings, as bees do. If you can distract it with something more interesting, it might not fly back to the feeder. On the other hand, since the trumpet vines attract hummingbirds, I’m not sure you’ve changed the situation.