I don’t really get it. Why do they look froze in a normal situation when a liquid gets around them. I saw a picture of a praying mantis and I assume if there is like water or more sticky stuff, they would look more drowning or compressed but the mantis had it’s arm spread out and it looks like without amber.
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Amber starts out as tree sap, an extremely sticky, sometimes very slowly flowing liquid. I can promise you that getting some sap on your skin is not exactly a pleasant experience, in the sense that truly cleaning it off is hard af. Basically you just let it cling to enough dirt so it eventuall rubs off, but it’s insanely good at sticking to stuff.
Small insects regularly become trapped by sap. They might have made an unfortunate landing on a patch of sap and got stuck or maybe were just hanging out and sap flowed over their feet. It is not surprising that those insects eventually became trapped, it would likely be similiar to a human having their legs submerged in sand. No way you could possibly escape, and every bit of struggle just covers more of your body in sap.
Most insects in amber are not in picture-perfect poses and the ones you do see are exceptional specimens.
Many of the ones that are for sale in the Dominican Republic are dead insects encased in an appropriately colored epoxy resin. If it looks too perfect, it should either be in a museum or someone paid too much for a fake.
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