pulchella = from the Latin pulcher ('beautiful, pretty') + -ella (a diminutive suffix, i.e. 'little, small' or as a term of endearment)
Size
Forewing 6.60 - 11.55 mm ♀; 7.20 - 11.75 mm ♂. US specimens are smaller, reaching only 9.90 mm, with those in British Columbia often larger.(3) In the US, generally smaller than Dicromantispa sayi.
Identification
Pronotum with no appreciable transverse ridges but with numerous fine setae visible in lateral view throughout its entire length(3)
Pterostigma forming an angle of >40° with the end of the RA
Back of head almost always with a single, solid, nearly-rectangular mark.
Wing venation conspicuously simpler than in Dicromantispa sayi.
Range
Widespread transcontinental; Canada (sw. ON & s. BC(3)) south to Costa Rica(4)
Food
Hosts are spiders commonly found on foliage (Anyphaenidae, Salticidae, Clubionidae, etc.) who also build silken retreats on leaves and under bark(3).
Life Cycle
First-instar larvae board spiders and wait until they gain access to freshly laid egg cases; they will not feed on eggs unless they have spent some time on the dorsum of the spider pedicel, where they apparently feed on the host's haemolymph(3)
Banks, Nathan (1912). Notes on Nearctic Mantispidae. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 14(3): 178-179. (Full Text)
Hoffman, K. M. and J. R. Brushwein (1989). Species of spiders (Araneae) associated with the immature stages of Mantispa puchella (Neuroptera, Mantispidae). J. Arachnol., 17:7-14. (Full Text at BHL or PDF)
Hoffman, K. M., & Brushwein, J. R. (1992). Descriptions of the Larvae and Pupae of Some North American Mantispinae (Neuroptera: Mantispidae) and Development of a System of Larval Chaetotaxy for Neuroptera. Trans. Amer. Entomol. Soc., 118(2), 159–196. (Full Text)
Hoffman, K. M., and S. W. Hamilton (1988). First record of a mantispine larva (Neuroptera: Mantispidae) associated with an adult caddisfly (Trichoptera: Leptoceridae). Ent. News 99(3):161-163. (Full Text)
Kral, Karl (2004). Vision in the mantispid: a sit‐and‐wait and stalking predatory insect. Physiological Entomology, 38(1):1-12. (Full Text)
Redborg K.E. (1998). Biology of the Mantispidae. Annual Review of Entomology, 43: 175-194. (Full Text)
