On my hike down an unfamiliar trail in an effort to find the entry to the Bell Cedar Swamp, I simply missed this guy and his two sidekicks. I never did find the Swamp—the trail simply petered out upland of any wet area—but on my way back, I paid more attention to the meadow I had walked through earlier and there, in plain sight, was a very large Praying Mantis. I see their spent egg cases pretty often, but an encounter with an adult is a pretty rare event. This time, I found three in close proximity. I'm guessing, based on size and the thin antennae, that this is a female, and that the other two were a smaller male and an intermediate sized female. The male kept his distance. He may have had the urge to mate, but he'd no doubt heard about its aftermath in these insects: the ultimate "fatal attraction."

Praying Mantis