As of: March 14, 2024, 7:30 p.m
By: Ines Alms
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Sometimes a flower is not a flower at all.
Perfect imitation has great advantages for animals when searching for prey.
And is often beautiful to the human eye.
In biology, mimesis refers to the deceptively real imitation of the environment or an object that is uninteresting to the animal being deceived, such as leaves, feces or twigs.
The camouflaging coloring and shape of the animals help hunters to be a harmless landing target for prey.
In the world of plants, the succulents Lithops, living stones, are a well-known example of this.
In other cases, a flower is simulated and the insects then fly to it in search of food - only to be eaten themselves.
Some animals have such a fascinating or pretty appearance that they are even kept as pets.
Orchid mantis – a flower-like appearance
Orchid mantises (Hymenopus coronatus) are insects that adapt perfectly to their substrate.
© Danita Delimont/Imago
Sometimes you don't have to say words to charm someone.
In a video on orquideashj
's TikTok channel,
the images speak for themselves: small magical creatures in pastel colors and white climb around on one hand.
When they sit still, they look deceptively similar to orchid flowers - hence why they are called orchid mantises.
Its biological species name is – somewhat less descriptively – crown mantis (Hymenopus coronatus).
And anyone who observes them more closely will quickly remember the green praying mantises (Mantis religiosa) native to Germany, the family-related mantis and the only mantis found in Central Europe.
The orchid mantids, however, have their home in the rainforests of Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia, India and Malaysia.
You can find even more exciting garden topics in the regular newsletter from our partner 24garten.de.
Orchid mantids can be kept in terrariums
Even though these are predatory insects and not pet animals or fairy creatures, the users' reactions to the video are consistently enthusiastic:
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“Ohhh Manties.
Like living orchids.
“Beautiful animals”
"Great!
I thought they were flowers, well nature can deceive you.
👍❤👍❤"
“There are over 2000 different species in all kinds of colors”
“How magical🥰little elves🥰”
The viewer may quickly feel tempted to get a terrarium and some of the beautiful orchid mantids - but the mantises are not nearly as easy to care for as they look: they require different temperatures during the day and night, a humidity of 50 to 60 percent and various live feeder insects.
Mantid beginners are advised not to use the animals.