Red-headed Bush Cricket

Even a simple dog walk can turn into a voyage of discovery. Last weekend, when letting my dogs chase chipmunks in Estabrook Woods, I found this little gem of a cricket, a species I had never seen before. It was a nymph of a Red-headed Bush Cricket (Phyllopalpus pulchellus), also known as the Handsome Trig…

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Don’t talk too loudly, somebody may be listening

Next time you see some wild flowers growing on the side of a road, look closely, and if you are lucky you may be able to spot an ambush bug. These small, cryptic insects are members of the genus Phymata, who in their feeding habits and some of the elements of their morphology resemble miniature…

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The amazing flying gooseberries

If you ever find yourself in South Africa during southern spring, and stay up long into the night, until midnight at least, you may be rewarded with one of the most incredible acoustic displays that the insect world has to offer. For this is the time when the bladder grasshoppers, known in Africa as the…

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My rainforest portrait studio

Katydids of the tribe Pterochrozini are some of the best leaf mimics that you can find in the Neotropical rainforest. Or rather the best mimics that you cannot find, as their resemblance to leaves, both green and shriveled, is so exquisite that in my 18 years of working in the Neotropics I have never found…

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Stay away from my cucumbers

My wife has been trying to grow cucumbers for years. Her thumbs are as green as the fuzzy layer of mold on my tent after a month in the Ghanaian rainforest, and yet the fickle plant had refused to produce any reproductive structures for years. Until now. Yesterday she harvested her first, beautiful cucumber from…

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Sharp spines, strange sex

I know many arachnophobes; in fact I live with one. But being afraid of spiders of the genus Micrathena is about as rational as being afraid of a diamond brooch. These animals are jewelry come alive, harmless, and each more ornate and vividly colored than the other. There are about 100 known species of Micrathena (Araneidae),…

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