Sight that caught me on the hop
UNTIL recently I would walk past the sound of grasshoppers and crickets chirruping away in the grass. I would presume the little chaps would hop out of the way to avoid my camera lens, but I was out this week and a bog bush cricket happily posed while I snapped away.
Days later I stepped out on one of our reserves and, again, I stopped to listen to the songs of the grasslands.
I focussed in and there was a meadow grasshopper sitting on a leaf in the sunshine. There was no way I was going to move it from its sunbathing spot.
Grasshoppers and crickets are the most intricate and interesting insects. They strike me as the kind of insect you would get in an Airfix box. You would get a set of instructions and carefully glue each piece on to the body, after you had painted it with bright greens and deep browns.
This grasshopper had green wings, legs and head, and a hooped black and grey body. It had long antennae and big brown eyes. It was a thing of real beauty. It is such a colourful creature that it is a surprise to think that it could be camouflaged but in lush grasses it is difficult to see. It is similar to the field grasshopper but without the hairy chest.
The meadow grasshopper is a resident of damp, unimproved pastures and meadows.
Grasshoppers go through a series of moults from wingless nymphs to winged adults, shedding their exoskeletons as they grow. Nymphs are present from April onwards, turning into adults in June. They feed on plants and grass.
Interestingly the main way to tell the difference between a grasshopper and cricket is that crickets have longer antennae.
A closer look will give you another clue. The song of these insects is known as ‘stridulating’. Crickets stridulate by rubbing their wings together while grasshoppers rub their hind legs against their wings. Males can be seen displaying to females by creating a song in this way – in this case, a regular ‘rrrr’ sound.
My grasshopper sat around for a while but then hopped off in a single bound to somewhere out of my sight. I was just grateful to have a little bit of time with this lovely creature.
The Wildlife Trust for Lancashire, Manchester and North Merseyside is dedicated to the protection and promotion of the wildlife in Lancashire, seven boroughs of Greater Manchester and four in Merseyside. It manages around 40 nature reserves and 20 local nature reserves covering woodland, wetland, upland and meadow. The trust has 27,000 members. To become one go to lancswt.org.uk or call 01772 324129. For more about Cheshire Wildlife Trust, call 01948 820728 or visit cheshirewildlifetrust. org.uk.