DESERT MANTIDAE 



253 



Fig. 144. Eremicqyhila turcica. 

 (After West wood.) 



Harpax ocellata that it " beats the Chameleon hollow in changing 

 colour." 



Some of the species of the old genus Eremia'phUa (Fig. 144) 

 are of very unusual form. De Saus- 

 sure considers that some species of 

 this genus are more highly modified 

 than any other animals for maintain- 

 ing their existence in desert regions. 

 They are said to be found in places 

 where no vegetation exists, and to 

 assimilate in appearance with the 

 sandy soil, the species varying in 

 colour, so that the individuals agree 

 in tint with the soil on which they 

 dwell. These Insects are referred to 

 the group Orthoderides, and have a 

 short prothorax, the alar organs being 

 unsuited for flight. What they live 

 on is not actually known ; although other Insects are the 

 natural food of Mantids, it is said that these desert-frequent- 

 ing species occur in spots where no other Insect life is known 

 to exist. Lefebvre ^ met with these Eremiaphilas in the desert 

 between the Nile and the Northern Oasis, El Bahryeh, but was 

 quite unable to discover their mode of subsistence. These 

 Insects are very rare in collections, and the information we 

 possess about them is very meagre. 



Mr. Graham Kerr found on the Pilcomayo river a species of 

 Mantidae living on branches of trees amongst lichens, which 

 it so exactly resembled that it was only detected by the move- 

 ment of a limb ; it was accompanied by a Phaneropterid grass- 

 hopper, which bore a similar resemblance to the lichens. One 

 of the rarest and most remarkable forms of Mantidae is the 

 genus Toxodera, in which the eyes project outwards as pointed 

 cones (Fig. 145). These Insects offer an interesting problem 

 for study, since we are entirely ignorant about them. Brunner 

 places the Toxoderae in his tribe Harpagides, but with the 

 remark that " these Insects of antediluvian shapes differ essen- 

 tially from all other Mantidae." 



. Wood-Mason informs us " that the young oiHymenopus hicornis 

 ^ Ann. Soc. ent. France, 1835, p. 457. - P. ent. Soc. London, 1877, p. xxix. 



