Alice Springs Desert Park
The genus Gyromantis are praying mantises belonging to the order Mantodea. These mantises are cryptic, blending into the background of the bark on the trunk of the trees where they can be found hiding in plain sight.

Pictured above is the female Gyromantis sp. The males have longer wings, reaching the end of the abdomen, and their abdomens are thinner as well.

At time of writing, there are only two recognised species of Gyromantis (listed below), with many more yet to be identified.




- Scientific classification
- Kingdom: Animalia
- Phylum: Arthropoda
- Subphylum: Hexapoda
- Class: Insecta
- Informal: Pterygotes
- Order: Mantodea
- Family: Amorphoscelidae
- Genus: Gyromantis
- Species:
- Gyromantis kraussi (Saussure, 1872)
- Gyromantis occidentalis Sjöstedt, 1918
Footnote & References
- Many thanks to Matthew Connors for ID, member of Entomology Australia “Invertebratology”, Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/groups/507004496955277/
- Gyromantis Giglio-Tos, 1913, Atlas of Living Australia, https://bie.ala.org.au/species/Gyromantis
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