Losing His Head over Something in Mind

Let me introduce you to my little friend. This is Big Boy, the same Carolina mantis in the picture that opens this web log, only now she has grown wings, and at the moment she is very rattled. In the other part of the cage which you can not see in this photo, she was about to attack a male who had something else in mind and had gotten too close, and as she did she accidentally disturbed another female that was hanging nearby. The second female unexpectedly attacked her from behind, and Big Boy spun around in defense flaring and rattling her wings. It was a rare moment in the cage, and I was lucky to get this image. The male ran off and the two females stood frozen in attacking positions each showing off their sharp talons. It took several hours for them to slowly back away from each other and fold up their wings. In my experience, the females rarely attack each other like this. Later in the week, I found the male unfortunately lying on the bottom of the cage, missing his head. Apparently whatever he had in mind was cause enough for him to lose it.