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Description
Let me recount the story.

I've always had some sort of affinity for Praying Mantids. I find them everywhere: around the house, in the garden, in my room, and once even in my wardrobe - I didn't realise it was there until I'd dressed myself and found it on my shoulder.

This particular one I found on a doorjamb. It was the largest I'd ever seen - at least ten centimetres (about four inches) long. Excited by the discovery, I grabbed a potplant from out of the garden and, placing my subject on it, borrowed my sister's camera and took a couple of shots. Most of them were rather blurred and I couldn't take too many, being as my sister's memory card was almost full.

This is, as far as I recall, the final photograph that I took of the mantis before taking it outside and releasing it in the garden. By this time - after being attacked by a curious cat and rudely moved from leaf to leaf by hand - it had taken on an alarmed, almost puzzled air, as if it wondered why this had to happen to him, of all people.

The mantis was completely unharmed and, given the average lifespan of the genus Mantodea, is possibly still alive today... although that might be wishful thinking. However, posthumously or not, I must offer my heartfelt thanks to my unwitting model. Its photographs were probably the best I've ever taken

Description
Let me recount the story.

I've always had some sort of affinity for Praying Mantids. I find them everywhere: around the house, in the garden, in my room, and once even in my wardrobe - I didn't realise it was there until I'd dressed myself and found it on my shoulder.

This particular one I found on a doorjamb. It was the largest I'd ever seen - at least ten centimetres (about four inches) long. Excited by the discovery, I grabbed a potplant from out of the garden and, placing my subject on it, borrowed my sister's camera and took a couple of shots. Most of them were rather blurred and I couldn't take too many, being as my sister's memory card was almost full.

This is, as far as I recall, the final photograph that I took of the mantis before taking it outside and releasing it in the garden. By this time - after being attacked by a curious cat and rudely moved from leaf to leaf by hand - it had taken on an alarmed, almost puzzled air, as if it wondered why this had to happen to him, of all people.

The mantis was completely unharmed and, given the average lifespan of the genus Mantodea, is possibly still alive today... although that might be wishful thinking. However, posthumously or not, I must offer my heartfelt thanks to my unwitting model. Its photographs were probably the best I've ever taken