Entry 2
The second location was focused on Arroyo Seco. In this area, there were many praying mantis. We found around 5 praying mantis which is odd because we did not find any of them in all the other 4 locations. There were also a lot of different kinds of spiders. This is an implication that there is a high amount of preys in the area. There are several implications to this situation. This is an ideal environment for praying mantis and that there is many food available. Spiders are usually predators among other insects, but comparing spiders and praying mantis, the praying mantis becomes the predator. These two predators will compete against each other for food.
We also found a lot of blue-green sharpshooter in the area. They feed on vines. This area is the perfect location for them because there were many vines living on the sides of the water. The soil was really rich which also helps the vine to thrive and survive. Most importantly, the blue-green sharpshooter serves as food for bigger insects like the spiders and praying mantis mentioned previously. Blue-green sharpshooters are much smaller in size compared to the predators so naturally they will become the preys. One interesting I noticed about them is that they come in two different colors, blue and green. After some research, I was still unable to explain why they come in different colors. My assumption would be it is based on their gender but this is unlikely because this would have easily come up in the research if it was true.
After some research, I learned that sometimes praying mantis are released into gardens as a means to pest control. It is stated, "For many years, the oothecae of non-native mantids have been released in gardens in the USA as a tool for controlling garden insect pests (Hurd 2008). However, the beneficial effect of these predators has been questioned (Antonelli and Glass 2004, Meyer 2010)." Most of the time praying mantis prey on smaller insects, they sometimes would even prey on each other and smaller vertebrates like small birds and lizards. While they are able to remove pests, they can bring negative effects as well. They are able to completely wipe out insect populations in an area if too many praying mantis is introduced. Therefore it is best to not disrupt the biodiversity in an area by introducing new insects.
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