Quick Snack

After the rain stopped there was a little thin sunshine. I wandered around the garden with my camera and was delighted to see the female praying mantis that I blipped on the first of the month. She had moved from the peppermint onto the adjacent Angelica, and until the cold weather struck I saw her every day. The snow flattened the Angelicas and caked them in ice. I searched in vain for her. But now the Angelicas have recovered and there she was, patiently awaiting a meal.

I took a couple of side shots of her, and then tried a low angle front shot. In the time it took for the camera to process that shot she caught a small fly and I missed it! I thought she’d raised her leg to groom it and took another shot. When I saw it on the computer screen there was the fly. She appeared to scoff it whole as there were no bits dropped around her as usually happens with larger insects. A moment later she was back in waiting mode.