Dark Raspy Cricket
S2, Female Nymph: Middle leg & foot
Dark Raspy Cricket
S2, Female Nymph: Front Leg & Foot
| Dark Raspy Cricket S2, Female Nymph: Middle leg & foot | | Dark Raspy Cricket S2, Female Nymph: Front Leg & Foot | | ||
 | Class: | Animals (Animalia) - Jointed Legs (Arthropoda) - Insects (Insecta) | |||
| Order: | Crickets, Grasshoppers & Katydids (Orthoptera) | ||||
| Family: | Leaf-rolling Cricket (Gryllacrididae) iNaturalist Observation | ||||
| Species: | Dark Raspy Cricket (Gryllacrididae sp ES01) | ||||
| This Photo: | S2, Female Nymph: Face | ||||
Thank you Matthew Connors for confirming the id of this species for us General Species Information: Found on Ellura (in the Murray Mallee, SA) and elsewhere S3 was the first adult we caught, and it was very sick. Could have been a spider bite, dehydration, etc. At first, we thought it was at it's end of life, but after giving it a drink and keeping it in a container all day it's vitality returned, so we released it. ~24-26mm head & body length. 45mm antennae length. A reddish brown face (black at some angles) with a white spot between the eyes and two oblong white patches above the antenna base. Their front legs have two vertical rows of strong spines to catch & hold prey. We were surprised that it was aggressive! David Rentz suggests they are ferocious. We heard it "rasping" it's wings but a video couldn't pick up the sound, it's too quiet. They are also called Leaf-rolling Crickets because they can produce webbing from their mouths to wrap a leaf up to hide in. Very similar to Leaf-curling spiders. Even more surprising is that it's wing venation is different from one side to the other. We found this on another specimen, so wing venation isn't diagnostic here. They can also have asymmetric genetalia - possibly can even have male & female genitalia. We can't be sure the nymph is the same species, but given we have only found one adult species and the features look to match up (spots on the face, etc) it's a reasonable assumption. We have photographed 6 of these, a female nymph in Nov and 5 male adults in Oct, Nov & Dec. | |||||
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