Praying mantises are more like women than scientists think
Dante’s Beach, Ravenna The night as ever was bloody hot and in the words of Dylan Thomas ‘bible black’ when a large female praying mantis blew in on the breeze through the open window of my ‘study’. It landed on my desk between the wine glass, the laptop and the little statue of Santa Rita, patron saint of impossible causes. I had been thinking that I had not seen a praying mantis this year and wished that I could. Now, by chance or destiny – or perhaps thanks to God Almighty himself – here was one on my desk: the colour of bronze, her long sleek body perhaps three inches long, with beady black eyes and a triangular sci-fi head from which protruded two long whisker-like horns.
