How the Praying Mantis Evolved to Hide in Plain Sight

In a humorous episode of his True Facts series, narrator Ze Frank examines the incredible praying mantis, noting how different species of this insect have evolved their physiology to hide in plain sight. This allows them to simultaneously hide from predators while being effective predators themselves.

You’ll notice that most of them go for a sort of camouflage situation. Now, this hideyhidy business is important. Not only because there’s birds out there with bad intentions, but also because mantids are ambush hunters. I don’t know how much ambushing you’ve done, but it works a lot better if they can’t see you.