A Privet Full of Praying Mantises

Ever since I found my first praying mantis laying her eggs on one of my trees two summers ago, I've been hoping against hope that enough of them would move in to rid me of some of the pests that are an inescapable part of any bonsai grower's life.

Of course that's wishful thinking. It would require a huge army of these tiny carnivores to do that!

Still, I enjoy seeing them on my trees and having witnessed the eggs being laid and hatching as well as the sad death of the babies, murdered by ants, I'm hoping I'll one day have the privilege of seeing the mating process too.

After finding three of them on the same tree I thought yesterday might be the day, but every time I looked they were keeping their distance from each other.

While I waited (in vain), I decided to take some photos.

Shooting one was easy but I knew that it would take a little coaxing on my part to get them all into the same photo. Fortunately I've observed that they will usually climb to the top of the tree if I spray water on it. So that's what I did.

My first attempt brought two together and I thought things were about to get interesting when one jumped onto another, but the second one wasn't interested and moved to a safe distance. Perhaps they were both the same gender.

For a while, however, they stayed near enough for me to get a few close-ups.

Finally a second spray of water brought the third one out of hiding and I was able to capture all three in the same shot.

I haven't seen them today. I haven't watered yet though, so they may put in an appearance later.

When last I saw them one had moved to the olive tree next door. I hope by now the others have moved on too because my Privet is in desperate need of pruning.

Autumn Colour

Spring is my favourite time of year, so I'm really jealous of all those bonsai growers in the Northern hemisphere whose deciduous trees  are just starting to bud and will soon turn green while many of mine will soon be bare.

The one consolation is the sight of these beautiful red leaves on two of my Trident Maple "weedlings", rescued at a workshop a couple of years ago when they were about to be consigned to a friend's compost heap.

The trees themselves are nothing more than sticks in pots right now:

With so many trees to care for, however, I'm planning to keep them really small, so the taller tree will soon be getting a serious chop. Not right now though, because I'm enjoying that colour far too much!

Revenge of the Mantis

A few days ago, while pruning one of my trees, I came across a praying mantis on my work surface. I'm pretty sure it's not the same one I first wrote about back in May 2017. This one seems much thinner and I'm convinced it's a male.

Once my work was done I coaxed him back into the tree and returned it to it's place in my bonsai area. When I looked for him later he seemed to have moved on and I felt the odds of finding him again was about as good as searching for a needle in a haystack. I was mistaken.

A couple of days later I picked up one of my sticks in pots, which I planned to bring inside to decapitate that night, and there he was. I didn't want to disturb him so I quickly returned the tree to its stand and chose a different tree to work on.

The fun started the next day when I found him in the middle of eating his lunch - a large ant. Revenge for the death of Mama Mantis's babies that were killed by ants a few months ago?

Of course I had to fetch my camera and record this mundane event. Then I had a flash of inspiration. If I found another ant and put it near to him, could I catch the kill on video?

The answer was yes.



Since then I've been feeding him a couple of times every day and for now he seems quite happy to stay in the little tree on which this video was shot. I hope things stay that way because I'd hate for him to move to another tree and then get a nasty surprise when I start pruning it without knowing he's there.

Birth and Death in the Bonsai Garden

In May I first introduced the praying mantis which laid its eggs on one of my little trees. A few days later she paid a visit to our house, but I was able to return her to my bonsai area without any drama. Sadly she hasn't been seen since. I sometimes wonder whether she climbed onto one of the trees I took to workshop the next day and ended up living in someone else's garden.

Since then I've been waiting impatiently for her eggs to hatch and once the weather started warming up I made a point of watching the ootheca every day in the hope of spotting signs of life. A few days ago I finally saw the signs of activity I'd been hoping for.

I was able to get a couple of quick shots of one of the babies which had already wandered a few inches down the trunk of the tree.

Then I turned my attention to the ootheca and was lucky enough to record the hatching of these two little ones.



While my camera was recording I kept an eye on the activity down below. Some of the babies were wandering across the moss and I feared they would climb off the pot onto the metal table I'd moved the tree to, just as their mother had done shortly after laying her eggs.

A little while afterwards I discovered that I was not the only one who'd been watching them. A few ants appeared and were soon carrying away the motionless bodies of some of the babies.

I can only assume that they had attacked the poor defenceless newborns while my attention was focused elsewhere.

When I saw what was happening I wished there was something I could do to save some of them. Although I was successful in coaxing one baby onto my finger, my efforts were in vain as it quickly jumped back onto the "safety" of the leaf from which it had come, and shortly after that it vanished.

The last signs of life I saw came from this one which lay on the moss for several minutes with one leg twitching every now and again before one of the ants carried it away.



Finally, with a feeling of sorrow, I was forced to return the tree to its shelf.

Return of the Mantis

The day after she laid her eggs my praying mantis was nowhere to be found. Having read that lady mantises don't live long after they lay their eggs, I feared I might never see her again. Still, every morning when I went out to water my trees I searched her stand in the hope that I'd find her.

Then yesterday she was back.

Once more she came out of hiding after getting a soaking from my hosepipe. Instead of fetching my camera this time I made a brief attempt to coax her into climbing on my hand (something I'd seen done on a YouTube video) but she simply ignored me. A little later, however, I noticed that she wanted to climb onto a leaf which was just out of her reach so I filled the gap with my hand and she was quite happy to use it as a bridge as she quickly moved across to her chosen destination.

I'm quite amazed to see how tame she is - so different from the lizards that live in my bonsai area. They run for cover as soon as they see me.

I spent most of the afternoon indoors but before closing up for the night I went to look for her. Much to my disappointment she'd vanished again. Then late last night I discovered her on a wall inside the house. She'd obviously found her way onto one of the frost-sensitive trees which I bring indoors at night when the weather gets chilly (*) and once inside she'd gone exploring. By the time I found her she was some distance from the nearest tree and the chance of her finding her way back to safety on her own seemed slim. Clearly it was up to me to rescue her.

I went outside to fetch a little tree from her stand and it didn't take too much effort to coax her onto that tree. Then I returned the tree to its home, leaving her safely in the area I usually see her, fully aware that she would go wandering again. Sure enough this morning I couldn't find her.

I just hope she chooses her destinations more wisely from now on.

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(*) As I said in a previous post, moving trees in and out of the house every day is NOT recommended unless you're able to do it without exposing them to extreme changes in temperature. It only works for me because our winters are relatively mild and my house isn't heated.

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Linking up with Camera Critters, Saturday Critters and Macro Monday 2

My Bonsai Friend - the Praying Mantis

A few days ago I mentioned the white stuff I found on one of my trees. Had I first seen it as it appears in that post, I imagine I'd have been really concerned and rushed to remove it. Fortunately that was not the case.

The story begins in late March. I was watering my trees when a rather wet praying mantis appeared seemingly from nowhere, jumping from one of my trees onto the metal stand below in an attempt to escape the water streaming out of my hosepipe.

In years gone by I'd have tried to relocate the little creature to a part of the garden where there are no bonsai, but I recently discovered that the praying mantis is a carnivore which preys on the pests that harm our trees. Under the circumstances I wanted her to stay so I did my best not to disturb her any further. Of course I also wanted to see if I could get a decent photo and she kindly posed for me, even walking towards the camera at one stage, enabling me to shoot from a better angle. Even the light from my camera's flash didn't seem to bother her.

March 2017

I saw her three more times over the next few days, then she seemed to disappear and I thought I'd seen the last of her. Then about a week ago she was back in one of the trees close to where I'd first seen her. She seemed to have grown a lot fatter, a fact which first made me suspect that she was a female. An online search for photos of praying mantises convinced me that I was right.

For several days after that I saw her hanging in the same tree, then one day I couldn't see her anywhere. Next day, however, I found her on a different tree with that patch of white "stuff" behind her.

May 2017 - laying her eggs

Although I'd never seen pictures of an ootheca (egg sac) before I was confident that I was witnessing my little friend laying eggs.

I immediately went to fetch my camera. After gently moving the tree onto a nearly table I was lucky enough to get some decent photos and even some video footage.



Once she was done laying her eggs she slowly climbed out of the tree onto the table. She seemed weak and I felt she was rather vulnerable there but luckily I was able to coax her into another tree and return her to the area she'd made her home.

The bad news is, I've read that once she's laid her eggs, Mama Mantis hasn't got long to live. I'm really going to miss her.

There's a Caterpillar on my Ficus Tree

With winter well and truly on the way I've already started protecting some of my more sensitive trees. As my greenhouse is too small for my requirements that gets a bit tricky. Some trees have to be moved out of it during the day so that I'm able to get inside to water the rest. I even bring a few trees into the kitchen at night because I've nowhere else to keep them.

Warning: For most people this isn't a good way to do things. I'm fortunate to live in a fairly mild climate and my house isn't heated, so my trees don't experience extreme changes in temperature when I move them around.

Moving my trees has one benefit though - I tend to examine them a bit more closely than I do during the summer months when they spend most of their time on one spot. That's how I happened to notice this little guy on one of my Ficuses a few days ago.

Luckily I noticed him while he was still quite small - less than an inch long. He'd already eaten about half a leaf, so I hate to think what damage he might have done to a relatively small tree if I hadn't noticed him until he was fully grown.

Once I'd done taking photos I removed the damaged leaf and put him into a bin with the weeds and some fallen leaves I've been clearing up. Hopefully he didn't find his way back onto my trees.

Hail and Bonsai

Nine years ago, just weeks after I joined my bonsai club, we were hit by the worst hail I've ever had the misfortune to experience. Stones the size of golf balls (or possibly larger) pelted our house, breaking 13 windows. Needless to say my small "bonsai" collection suffered significant damage too.

Among the trees that were damaged that night was my "pride and joy", a little Serissa (really just a stick in a pot) which I had wired only days earlier and which I misguidedly believed was well on its way to making a beautiful bonsai. It lost an important branch that night and with it my hopes for its immediate future were dashed. Sadly that tree died about a year later in the great vinegar disaster.

Another victim of the hail was a fairly substantial Crassula which I'd grown from a cutting a few years earlier. It was so badly damaged that I was forced to cut it back to a stump, while a little Portulacaria which I had hoped to turn into a cascade had to be totally restyled.

I still have both those trees but due to the brittle nature of succulents I've never put much effort into styling either of them. Hopefully I will some day.

Remarkably no trees died that night, proving how resilient a healthy plant can be.

Thankfully the storm that hit us two weeks ago was minor by comparison. A few of my trees lost small branches, but for the most part the damage was restricted to shredded foliage.

Hail damage

I'm not aware of any structural damage to this little ficus, but I'm sure glad it wasn't in this sorry state for its appearance at our club show last month.

Ficus Natalensis two weeks after the hail

After the Storm

Late afternoon thunderstorms are a normal part of summer where I live, though sadly they've been a rarity over the last couple of summers. I don't enjoy the storms, but when you're living through a drought, grey skies are a welcome sight and rain of any nature is a blessing.

We had a massive storm this afternoon with heavy rain, booming thunder and a lawn blanketed in hail. It was after 7:00 pm by the time calm was restored, allowing me to go outside to water the trees in my greenhouse, and I wasn't too happy with the sight that greeted me - shredded leaves scattered all over the paving and a few trees standing in pots full of hailstones, among them this tiny Ficus burtt-davyi:

 As it was already dark outside I wasn't able to inspect my trees properly so I'm not sure whether there was any more serious damage.

To put it all in perspective, however, there have been reports of over 100 cars stuck on a flooded highway about five kilometres from where I live as well as two storm-related deaths nearby.

And through it all I can't help wondering whether any rain fell in the areas where it's needed most.

A Visitor to the Bonsai Garden

Things have been rather quiet in the bonsai garden lately. It's not that I haven't had work to do on my trees, because there's always more than I can cope with, but I just couldn't find the time for what needed doing. And when I did have some free time, the weather seemed determined to keep me indoors.

The only significant gardening I've managed recently was removing the air layer from a problem mulberry tree growing in our garden.

Today I finally found some time to get out among my trees and I got a little much-needed work done, though not as much as I'd hoped to. I removed a lot of unwanted new buds that had sprouted all over the trunk of an olive tree and tidied up my little ficus pumila, which had been growing wild for most of the summer. I removed some new branches from a maple tree because they had ugly long internodes and would have spoiled the appearance of the tree. Finally I did a bit of weeding.

When I was done I started looking for trees I could bring inside to work on during tomorrow's cricket. And that was when I spotted the visitor. He was hanging upside-down, clinging on to a leaf on one of my ficus trees.

A grasshopper clinging on to one of my bonsai trees

I have no idea who this guy is. Some sort of grasshopper, I guess, but he's far more colourful than any grasshopper I've met before. I suppose I'll have to do some research because I'd really like to know his name.

Naturally I'm never happy when I come across a creature that is likely to damage one of my trees, but when a photo opportunity comes along I'm always prepared to sacrifice the odd leaf in the hope of getting an interesting shot, so I immediately headed inside to fetch my camera, keeping my fingers crossed that he'd still be there when I returned.

Fortunately the little guy wasn't very active and I was able to take my time in setting up the shot. In fading light, however, even the smallest movement on his part caused most of my photos to come out rather blurry so I decided to experiment with my camera's video feature instead.



He was quite cooperative, and I must have spent close to 30 minutes poking my camera in his face, but eventually he got tired of my interference and jumped off the tree.

When I closed up for the night, he has still out there somewhere. I just hope he decides to leave my bonsai area before he does too much damage.

Trouble in Bonsai Land

There's an art to watering bonsai. Unfortunately I've never had the time to learn it. I've got so many trees that I've been forced to use the quickest method, so I've always watered my trees using a hosepipe with a fine spray attachment. It still takes me about twenty minutes to water them all.

Unfortunately all that has to change, effective immediately. South Africa has been hit hard by El Niño. Right now we're in the middle of a heatwave. The temperature where I live has peaked at 36°C (96.8°F) today and in some areas it's a lot worse. The weather has been like that for weeks already, and summer hasn't even arrived yet.

To make matters worse, the heatwave has been accompanied by a severe drought. At this time of year we usually have thunderstorms most afternoons, but there's hardly been a drop of rain since spring started and forecasters are already predicting that we aren't likely to see any significant rain until March.

Our garden is quite stressed and the lawn looks like a bed of straw. My bonsai collection, however, has been getting adequate water and my trees are doing fine. So far.

Yesterday our government announced water restrictions:

• we're not allowed to fill swimming pools - no problem, we don't have one.
• we can't use a hosepipe for washing cars or paving - not great, but I can live with that.
• we're not allowed to water our gardens between 6:00 am and 6:00 pm. That's a serious problem.

Conserve Water Square Sticker by InkWorks

I'm a night owl, so getting up at 5:00 am to water my trees would require a major change to my lifestyle. Aside from that, the light isn't very good at that time of morning. And I don't really see that I'll be saving water anyway.

Watering at 6:00 pm isn't much better. Aside from the fact that my trees will be wet for the night, exposing them to problems like mildew, once again I'll be watering in bad light. And I still won't be saving water.

There has to be a better way.

The only option I've come up with so far is to use the pressure spray bottle I've always used for giving my trees liquid fertilizer - something I often neglect to do because it's too time consuming.

The bottle takes twelve litres of water and filling it three or four times should be enough to cover all my trees, so I'll be saving a lot of water doing that. With minimal water consumption I don't think that watering during daylight hours is a major issue in terms of our water restrictions.

It's going to have a dramatic effect on my life though. I've just spent an hour watering some of my trees, taking the opportunity to add a little liquid fertilizer, something which was long overdue. But I've been forced to take a break halfway through because it's so hot in the sun that I couldn't take being outside any more.

There's a breeze blowing outside now, and the clouds are starting to build up. Sadly they're not likely to bring us any much needed rain.

Now I need to go outside to water the rest of my trees.

Update: 20 June 2016

I was forced to abandon this method and water my trees at 6:00 pm because some of them weren't getting enough water. I nearly killed a few little ones before I realised the error of my ways.

Watching Nature in Action

While tending my bonsai trees I've learnt to develop an appreciation for other aspects of nature that I never took much notice of in the past.

Part of that involves observing the creatures that visit my bonsai garden and trying to work out whether they are going to harm my little trees.

At certain times of the year I'll come across unwelcome guests like grasshoppers and caterpillars and those need to be relocated before they can do any serious damage. As a photographer, however, I'll often spend a little time trying to get a decent shot before I move them to a part of the garden where there are no bonsai trees. I've managed to get some nice shots that way, like this one of a pretty striped caterpillar which I found eating the leaves on one of my trees a couple of years ago.

Resident in my bonsai garden are some little lizards, or to be more accurate geckos. I often see them scampering along the walls and some even seem to have made their home inside my greenhouse. They're tiny creatures - around two inches in length - and move quite quickly, so I was lucky to get this photo of one on the frame of my greenhouse before I frightened it off.

I had a rare experience inside my greenhouse today. While I was watering my trees I noticed a small moth hiding beneath the leaves. Apparently my activity disturbed it because, no sooner had I seen it than it flew off in the direction of the greenhouse ceiling. Sadly the window wasn't open so it was unable to get out, but headed to the back wall where one of my gecko friends was hiding in the framework. In a flash it grabbed the moth, but the startled creature somehow managed to escape and flew back towards the ceiling. Then for some mysterious reason it flew back in the direction from which it had come, and this time there was no escaping the jaws of the gecko.

How I wish I'd had a video camera on hand, because that's not something I'm ever likely to witness again.

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Linking up to The Ultimate Rabbit Hole, Saturday's Critters and Camera Critters.