Abstract. Climate change influences the global and regional distribution of many
species. For thermophilic insects, range expansions towards the north and to
higher elevations are expected in the course of climatic warming across the
Northern Hemisphere. The distribution of the European mantis (Mantis religiosa) has recently
expanded from Mediterranean regions in France to Hesse in central Germany.
This is interpreted as a response to rising mean temperatures, and further
northward expansion is expected to occur with increasing climate warming. In
this study, potential changes in the regional distribution across Hesse were
modeled for Mantis religiosa using the present distribution and climate across Europe as
the baseline. We estimated potential changes in the regional distribution for
two time periods until 2080 based on two climate change scenarios. The
results showed that the current range of M. religiosa in Hesse is smaller than expected
based on its climatic niche, i.e., the distribution is not in equilibrium
with the present climate. With climate warming the model predicts an
expansion of the potential distribution for the period 2041–2060. For the
period 2061–2080, our model predicts, however, a range contraction in
spite of continued warming. This unexpected result warrants further
investigation in order to elucidate whether the ongoing climate change may
have negative consequences for thermophilic species such as M. religiosa.