Pretty Shiny Things ...

On the East side of the property where I grew up, my Papaw had a Christmas tree farm. It was great, my sister and I loved it! Lots of baby Christmas trees all down the east side of the property. We would regularly play in the Christmas trees; we lived for games like hide-and-seek, race to the end of the row of Christmas trees, try to remember which Christmas tree we left our drink at, etc. 


During the most awesome time of the year, late spring/early summer, the Christmas trees were alive with all kinds of critters. Bird nests, insects, awesome black-and-yellow argiopes who would sit in their massively beautiful webs in between two Christmas trees. Occasionally there would be bunny nests under them, as well, if Blackjack or Fragile didn't find them and eat them. (Yes, the cat and dog were avid hunters of all things smaller than them ... )


One early summer, Lainey and I were playing in the Christmas trees when we spotted something we had never seen before. It was so pretty, like a little hunk of gold just sitting in the Christmas tree. After studying it for a while and deciding it didn't belong there, we carefully removed it and took it inside to show Mom.


Mom didn't know what it was either, but like most things we found for her that weren't alive, she put it in the corner shelf as a decoration. There it sat. Just sitting there on the shelf, looking all pretty and shiny, until one day when it was not so pretty and shiny anymore. It was open and disfigured, although we didn't notice until:


Mom had decided to go into the living room for who knows what. Maybe she was wanting to watch television or just sit on the couch. Still don't know, don't really care. That's when she noticed the coffee table was moving. And the floor. And the ceiling. Somehow, for no apparent reason, a load of cute little baby praying mantises had made their way into the house and had taken over.


It was a mantis war, right there smack-dab in the middle of our living room. There were baby mantises eating baby mantises who were just finishing up eating another mantis. According to my mom, the entire room looked like it was moving because of all the baby mantises crawling around and eating each other.


Much to Mom's dismay, she now had an infestation of mantises; she is not the lover of bugs like I am. After freaking out in a most unnerving manner, she was able to get to the phone and call my aunt. My aunt probably laughed hysterically before coming down to the house equipped with: A vacuum cleaner. She swept up all the baby mantises.


I'm not sure what happened to all those mantises. I don't know if they were set free or died in the vacuum bag. I hope they were set free, I should probably find out. 


Moral of the story: Yes, praying mantis egg sacs are gold and shiny and pretty. Just so you know. They don't belong in the house on a shelf for decoration.