Dark bush-cricket | |
---|---|
| |
Male of Pholidoptera griseoaptera | |
![]() | |
Female of Pholidoptera griseoaptera | |
Scientific classification ![]() | |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Arthropoda |
Class: | Insecta |
Order: | Orthoptera |
Suborder: | Ensifera |
Family: | Tettigoniidae |
Subfamily: | Tettigoniinae |
Tribe: | Pholidopterini |
Genus: | Pholidoptera |
Species: | P. griseoaptera |
Binomial name | |
Pholidoptera griseoaptera (De Geer, 1773) | |
Synonyms | |
|
The dark bush-cricket (Pholidoptera griseoaptera) is a flightless species of European bush-cricket; it is the type species of its genus with no subspecies. [1]
Pholidoptera griseoaptera can reach a body length of 11 to 21 mm (males) and 15 to 20 mm (females), much smaller than the similar Pholidoptera aptera . The sickle-shaped and upward curved ovipositor of the females is 8 to 10 mm long, while the males have two short cerci. The antennae and the hind legs are quite long.
The rounded brachypterous wings of the males are brown with light brown to ochre-coloured edges and are about 5 mm in length (about as long as the pronotum). The females are almost wingless or have half-round, grey-brown fore-wings that are 1-2 mm long. Long-winged (macropterous) forms are not recorded.
This species can be found in Europe from northern Spain up to Crimea, Caucasus and the Near East. It is fairly common in Great Britain, but not recorded from Ireland. [1] On the Isle of Man the species is legally protected under Schedule 5 of the Wildlife Act 1990, being found at only two coastal sites (Lonan and Glen Maye) at the extreme north of the species’ British Isles distribution. Adults are omnivorous, feeding primarily on small insects such as aphids and caterpillars, but eat also plants such as bramble ( Rubus species), dandelion ( Taraxacum species) and nettles ( Urtica species). The stridulation is a brief and penetrating sound, repeatedly irregularly night and day.
The dark bush-cricket colonizes a variety of habitats, but avoids sandy soils and are accordingly rare in sandy areas. It is mainly present in forest edges or clearings, but can be found also in wasteland, parks and gardens, at an elevation of about 0–2,100 metres (0–6,890 ft) above sea level.
The females lay their eggs in the soil, in dead branches, in bark crevices and rotting wood. The eggs need high humidity. The larvae require two years for their full development, with seven larval stages. They feed exclusively on vegetables. Nymphs appear at the end of April of the third year, while the first adults appear in June.
Insects in the family Tettigoniidae are commonly called katydids, or bush crickets. They have previously been known as "long-horned grasshoppers". More than 6,400 species are known. Part of the suborder Ensifera, the Tettigoniidae are the only extant (living) family in the superfamily Tettigonioidea.
Mole crickets are members of the insect family Gryllotalpidae, in the order Orthoptera. Mole crickets are cylindrical-bodied insects about 3–5 cm (1.2–2.0 in) long as adults, with small eyes and shovel-like fore limbs highly developed for burrowing. They are present in many parts of the world and where they have arrived in new regions, may become agricultural pests.
Gryllinae, or field crickets, are a subfamily of insects in the order Orthoptera and the family Gryllidae.
Roesel's bush-cricket, Roeseliana roeselii is a European bush-cricket, named after August Johann Rösel von Rosenhof, a German entomologist.
The wart-biter is a bush-cricket in the family Tettigoniidae. Its common and scientific names derive from the eighteenth-century Swedish practice of allowing the crickets to nibble at warts to remove them.
The speckled bush-cricket is a flightless species of bush-cricket belonging to the family Tettigoniidae. The species was originally described as Locusta punctatissima in 1792.
The black-capped social weaver is a sparrow-like of bird that has been assigned to the weaverbird family. It was originally described by Fisher and Reichenow, and later re-classified by the latter to the genus Pseudonigrita. Adults have a large black cap, ivory-colored bill, red eyes, brown back and wings, blackish-brown tail, white throat and underparts with a black midline, and dark horn-colored legs. It breeds in colonies and roofed nests with an entrance at the bottom in thorny trees such as acacias are constructed by the male from grass stems. It is found in parts of Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, and Tanzania. It is sometimes kept and bred in captivity.
Crickets are Orthopteran insects which are related to bush crickets, and, more distantly, to grasshoppers. In older literature, such as Imms, "crickets" were placed at the family level, but contemporary authorities including Otte now place them in the superfamily Grylloidea. The word has been used in combination to describe more distantly related taxa in the suborder Ensifera, such as king crickets and mole crickets.
Rhagoletis juglandis, also known as the walnut husk fly, is a species of tephritid or fruit fly in the family Tephritidae. It is closely related to the walnut husk maggot Rhagoletis suavis. This species of fly belongs to the R. suavis group, which has a natural history consistent with allopatric speciation. The flies belonging to this group are morphologically distinguishable.
Schizodactylus monstrosus or the maize cricket, is a species of large, robust cricket found in Asia, belonging to the family Schizodactylidae. It is found mainly in sandy habitats along rivers, and has large flattened tarsal extensions and wings that are curled at the tip, right above the cerci. They are nocturnal and show a high degree of variation in activity during the day and night. They hide in burrows that they dig on their own during the day.
Tettigonia cantans is a species of bush crickets belonging to the family Tettigoniidae subfamily Tettigoniinae.
Yersinella raymondi, common name Raymond's Bush-cricket, is a species of "katydids crickets" belonging to the family Tettigoniidae subfamily Tettigoniinae. The scientific name Yersinella comes from the name of the entomologist who has described the species in 1860.
Conocephalus fuscus, the long-winged conehead, is a member of the family Tettigoniidae, the bush-crickets and is distributed through much of Europe and temperate Asia. This bush-cricket is native to the British Isles where it may confused with the short-winged conehead. These two species are phenotypically similar; however, the distinguishing factor between the two is the fully developed set of wings the long-winged conehead possesses that allows for flight. In the short-winged coneheads the hind wings are shorter than the abdomen, causing the wings to be vestigial and the species is incapable of flight. For this reason it is hard to discriminate between the two species during the early stages of their life cycle before the wings have fully developed. The colouration of the conehead is typically a grass green with a distinctive brown stripe down its back, though there are some brown phenotypes.
The Tridactylidae are a family in the insect order Orthoptera. They are small, mole-cricket-like insects, almost always less than 20 mm (0.79 in) long when mature. Generally they are shiny, dark or black, sometimes variegated or sandy-coloured. They commonly live in short tunnels and are commonly known as pygmy mole crickets, though they are not closely related to the true "mole crickets" (Ensifera), as they are included in the Caelifera suborder.
Antaxius pedestris is a species of "katydids crickets" belonging to the family Tettigoniidae. It was originally described by Johan Christian Fabricius under the scientific name of Locusta pedestris.
Parcoblatta uhleriana, the Uhler's wood cockroach, is a species of Parcoblatta native to the United States and Canada. It is a forest species also found in disturbed and urban environments. The male of the species flies freely, while the female does not fly.
Neoscapteriscus vicinus, the tawny mole cricket, is a species of insect in the mole cricket family, Gryllotalpidae. Colombian insect taxonomist Oscar Cadena-Castañeda studied specimens of the genus that had been called Scapteriscus, and decided that it included two groups; a smaller group and a larger group that he named Neoscapteriscus in 2015. It is native to South America and also occurs in the Southern United States, where it arrived as a contaminant of ship's ballast around 1900. North American mole cricket taxonomists agreed with his decision and altered Orthoptera Species File Online accordingly.
Scapteriscus abbreviatus, the short-winged mole cricket, is a species of insect in the mole cricket family, Gryllotalpidae. It is native to South America but has been introduced inadvertently into Florida, in the United States. Unlike other related species, it is unable to fly, nor do the males emit songs in order to attract females.
Anurogryllus arboreus, the common short-tailed cricket or arboreal short-tailed cricket, is a species of cricket in the family Gryllidae. It is native to the southern and south-eastern United States where it lives in a burrow that it digs.
Nemobius sylvestris, the wood cricket, is a flightless species of cricket in the family Gryllidae. It is native to Western Europe and North Africa but uncommon in Britain.