Male Toe Biter carrying Eggs

bugman

May 19th, 2008 at 12:00 am

Categories

Eggs

baby mantids, toe biter, and painted lady butterfly
Hello! First, I’d like to let you know that my kids and I are huge fans of your site! My four year old son, in particular, is quite the insect enthusiast and loves to look at the photos on your site. We don’t need help identifying the insects in the attached photos, but thought you might like them. We had a praying mantis egg case that hatched just this morning. It was so exciting to wake up and find hundreds of adorable baby mantids waiting for us! I took a couple of photos before we released them into our garden. I’d also ordered some painted lady caterpillars, which the kids and I raised and had a lot of fun observing. I took a photo of one before we released it, also this morning. Finally, yesterday I took the kids to a local park where we caught this incredible toe biter. We’d only ever seen them in books, so we were thrilled to observe a live specimen. Thanks to your site, we know it’s a male with the eggs cemented to his back. We gave him a couple of tadpoles in case he gets hungry, but so far he’s left them alone. The toe biter got to spend the day at preschool with my son, and after dinner we’re going to take him back to the park. Our question is, can a toe biter fly when he has eggs stuck to his back? Thanks so much for the amazing site! We’ve all got our fingers crossed that at least one of our photos makes it onto the site. You don’t want to disappoint a four year old, do you? We know you’re really busy this time of year–keep up the great work!
The Ganino Family
Ps We live in Connecticut, near the shoreline!

Dear Ganino Family,
The problem with using strictly common names for identification purposes is that they tend to overlap. Your Toe Biter is in the genus Belostoma, smaller individuals than the more commonly submitted larger Lethocerus species. The Lethocerus do not cement the eggs to the back of the male like the Belostoma do. Males cannot fly while the eggs are being carried about.