Internal state effects on behavioral shifts in freely behaving praying mantises (Tenodera sinensis)

How we interact with our environment largely depends on both the external cues presented by our surroundings and the internal state from within. Internal states are the ever-changing physiological conditions that communicate the immediate survival needs and motivate the animal to behaviorally fulfill them. Satiety level constitutes such a state, and therefore has a dynamic influence on the output behaviors of an animal. In predatory insects like the praying mantis, hunting tactics, grooming, and mating have been shown to change hierarchical organization of behaviors depending on satiety. Here, we analyze behavior sequences of freely hunting praying mantises (Tenodera sinensis) to explore potential differences in sequential patterning of behavior as a correlate of satiety. First, our data supports previous work that showed starved praying mantises were not just more often attentive to prey, but also more often attentive to further prey. This was indicated by the increased time fraction spent in attentive bouts such as prey monitoring, head turns (to track prey), translations (closing the distance to the prey), and more strike attempts. With increasing satiety, praying mantises showed reduced time in these behaviors and exhibited them primarily towards close-proximity prey. Furthermore, our data demonstrates that during states of starvation, the praying mantis exhibits a stereotyped pattern of behavior that is highly motivated by prey capture. As satiety increased, the sequenced behaviors became more variable, indicating a shift away from the necessity of prey capture to more fluid presentations of behavior assembly.

A Computational Model of Stereoscopic Prey Capture in Praying Mantises”

We present a simple model which can account for the stereoscopic sensitivity of praying mantis predatory strikes. The model consists of a single “disparity sensor”: a binocular neuron sensitive to stereoscopic disparity and thus to distance from the animal. The model is based closely on the known behavioural and neurophysiological properties of mantis stereopsis. The monocular inputs to the neuron reflect temporal change and are insensitive to contrast sign, making the sensor insensitive to interocular correlation. The monocular receptive fields have a excitatory centre and inhibitory surround, making them tuned to size. The disparity sensor combines inputs from the two eyes linearly, applies a threshold and then an exponent output nonlinearity. The activity of the sensor represents the model mantis’s instantaneous probability of striking. We integrate this over the stimulus duration to obtain the expected number of strikes in response to moving targets with different stereoscopic distance, size and vertical disparity. We optimised the parameters of the model so as to bring its predictions into agreement with our empirical data on mean strike rate as a function of stimulus size and distance. The model proves capable of reproducing the relatively broad tuning to size and narrow tuning to stereoscopic distance seen in mantis striking behaviour. The model also displays realistic responses to vertical disparity. Most surprisingly, although the model has only a single centre-surround receptive field in each eye, it displays qualitatively the same interaction between size and distance as we observed in real mantids: the preferred size increases as prey distance increases beyond the preferred distance. We show that this occurs because of a stereoscopic “false match” between the leading edge of the stimulus in one eye and its trailing edge in the other; further work will be required to find whether such false matches occur in real mantises. This is the first image-computable model of insect stereopsis, and reproduces key features of both neurophysiology and striking behaviour.

Complete mitochondrial genomes of four species of praying mantises (Dictyoptera, Mantidae) with ribosomal second structure, evolutionary and phylogenetic analyses

Praying mantises are distributed all over the world. Though some Mantodea mitogenomes have been reported, an evolutionary genomic and phylogenetic analysis study lacks the latest taxonomic system. In the present study, four new mitogenomes were sequenced and annotated. Deroplatys truncate, D. lobate, Amorphoscelis chinensis and Macromantis sp. belong to Deroplatyidae, Amorphoscelidae and Photinaidae family, respectively. Our results indicated that the ATP8 gene may be lost in D. truncate and D. lobata mt genome, and four tRNA genes have not been found in D. truncate, D. lobata and Macromantis sp. A dN/dS pair analysis was conducted and it was found that all genes have evolved under purifying selection. Furthermore, we tested the phylogenetic relationships between the eight families of the Mantodea, including 35 species of praying Mantis. Based on the complete mitochondrial genome data, it was also suggested as sister to Deroplatyidae + Mantidae, Metallyticus sp., the only representative of Metallyticidae, is sister to the remaining mantises. Our results support the taxonomic system of Schwarz and Roy and are consistent with previous studies.

Diversity of Insect Pests and Ecofriendly Fauna Inhabiting Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) Agro-Ecosystem in Bundelkhand Region of Uttar Pradesh

An experiment was conducted at Agricultural Research Farm of Brahmanand Post Graduate College, Rath, Hamirpur (U.P.) during 2016-17 and 2019-20 cropping season. In the Bundelkhand agro climatic region seventeen species of insect belonging to seven orders and twelve families were recorded from chickpea agro ecosystem. Among which six species from Lepidoptera, four species from hymenoptera, two species from coleoptera and odonata and one species from hemiptera, isoptera, and dyctyoptera were identified. On the basis of economic importance nine species were insect pests, five species were predators, two species were insect parasitoids and one species was insect pollinator. Among the nine species of insect pests, chickpea pod borer, Helicoverpa armigera Hub. and gram cut worm, Agrotis ipsilon (Huf.) occurred regularly and chickpea pod borer was designated as a major pest while, gram cut worm infested with very low population density and considered as minor insect pest of chickpea. The five species of insect pest occurred occasionally i.e. armyworm, Mythmina separate (walker), tobacco caterpillar, Spodoptera litura (Fab), cow pea aphid, Aphis craccivora (Koch), termite, Odentotermes obesus (Rambur) and black flea beetle, Altica Species (unidentified species) were designated as minor pest of chickpea. While, two species namely, Bihar hairy caterpillar, Spilarctia obliqua (Walker) and beet armyworm, Spodoptera oxiqua (Hub) occurred intermittently in sporadic manner and designated as stray pest of chickpea. The eight species of insect’s ecofriendly fauna inhabiting chickpea agro ecosystem were observed, among which five species of predators, two species of parasitoids and one species of pollinators foraged on chickpea crop occasionally in very low population density. The maximum number of ecofriendly fauna was of the order hymenoptera, two species of parasitoids, one species of predators and pollinator i.e. Trichogrammatid wasp, Trichogramma chilonis (Ishii), ichneumonid wasp, Campoletis chloridae (Uchida), common yellow wasp, Vespa oreintalis (L.) and small honeybee, Apis floraea followed by odonata i.e. dragonfly, Croccothemis servielia (Drury) and damsel fly, Agriocnemis pygmiea (Rambur), coleoptera, rove beetle, Alleochara billienata and dyctyoptera, praying mantis, Mantis religiosa (L.).

The luring mantid: Protrusible pheromone glands in Stenophylla lobivertex (Mantodea: Acanthopidae)

The hitherto unknown pheromone gland of female Stenophylla lobivertex Lombardo, 2000, a poorly understood praying mantis distributed in the Neotropics, is described and figured. In contrast to other mantodeans, this species has a protrusible, bifurcated (Y-shaped) gland of 6 mm length. It is protracted by sexually receptive females during nighttime and only when undisturbed. The significance of this morphological and behavioral adaptation is discussed in light of the reproductive strategy of the species and its assumed rarity in the natural habitat.

Taxonomic revision of the praying mantis subfamily Hierodulinae of China (Mantodea: Mantidae)

Species known from China in the praying mantis subfamily Hierodulinae are revised. A new species, Titanodula menglaensis sp. nov. is described. Hierodula tenuidentata Saussure, 1869 and Dracomantis mirofraternus Shcherbakov & Vermeersch, 2020 are newly recorded from China. Two new synonyms are proposed: Titanodula formosana (Giglio-Tos, 1912) = Titanodula fruhstorferi (Werner, 1916), syn. nov. and Hierodula macrodentata Wang, Zhou & Zhang, 2020 = Hierodula latipennis Brunner de Wattenwyl, 1893. Ootheca and male genitalia of the Chinese species are described and photographed. An identification key to genera and species of Hierodulinae from China is also provided. The current Chinese checklist contains 21 species.

First record of the genus Arria (Mantodea, Haaniidae, Arriini) from Thailand, with the description of a new species of moss-dwelling praying mantis

Arria muscoamicta Unnahachote & Shcherbakov, sp. nov. is described based on a male from central Thailand. This is the first record of Arria Stål, 1877 from the country. The new species is closely allied to A. leigongshanensis (Ge & Shen, 2008) from China, differing by the absence of prozonal tubercles, the elongated pronotum, nine tibial anteroventral spines, and the truncated hindwings. The new species is a moss-camouflaging mantis living at high altitude. The taxonomic problems of the genus are briefly discussed.

Species delimitation of the praying mantis Hierodula patellifera (Audinet-Serville) based on morphological and molecular characters (Mantodea: Mantidae)

An integrative taxonomic analysis of Hierodula patellifera (Audinet-Serville) is presented based on morphological and molecular characters (COI, 28S rDNA). During repeated trips to the Korean peninsula, we collected unusual specimens from Wanju-gun. They were similar to H. patellifera, but can be distinguished by a larger body size, the number and shape of spines on foreleg, and the shape of male genitalia. To examine the phenotypes and delimit H. patellifera from fourteen sampled populations, we used forecoxal spines and male genitalia as key morphological characters, as well as molecular data including gene tree monophyly and genetic divergence data. The molecular analyses (p-distance, neighbor-joining, and parsimony analyses) did not separate the specimens as two distinct species. The diagnostic characters of H. patellifera are illustrated with habitus images.

A new species of the genus Arria Stål, 1877 (Mantodea, Haaniidae) from China with notes on the tribe Arriini Giglio-Tos, 1919

A new species of the praying mantis genus Arria Stål, Arria purasp. nov. from southwest China is described and illustrated. An overview, comparison, and distribution data of this tribe are given. A new synonym is created: Sinomiopteryx yunnanensis Xu, 2007 is a junior synonym of Arria pallida (Zhang, 1987). One new combination Arria brevifrons (Wang, 1991) comb. nov. (from Sinomiopteryx Tinkham), is proposed.