Blue-winged wasteland cricket
| Blue-winged wasteland cricket | ||||||||||||
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Blue-winged Badlands Cricket ( Oedipoda caerulescens ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Oedipoda caerulescens | ||||||||||||
| ( Linnaeus , 1758) |
The blue-winged wasteland insect ( Oedipoda caerulescens ) is a species of the wasteland terrors ( Oedipodinae) within the short-antennae terrors (Caelifera). The blue wing markings of the animals and their preference for dry habitats with little vegetation give it its name.
features
The males of the blue-winged wasteland insect reach a body size of 13 to 23 millimeters, the females are between 20 and 29 millimeters and thus significantly larger than the males. The chest section ( thorax ) is strong and the abdomen ( abdomen ) is relatively slim. The animals have long and narrow wings as well as relatively short but powerful jump legs.
As with the other species of the genus Oedipoda, the basic color of the animals is a finely to coarsely marbled gray-brown, although the species is very variable in color and pattern. The color can range from a light gray to almost black, and ocher and red-brown tints are also common. This is an adaptation to the subsurface, which is developed gradually with the individual larval moults, but adult animals are also still capable of a color change. The wings and the hind legs have two to three broad darker stripes, which are more indistinct in very light and also very dark specimens. The most striking feature is the blue-transparent coloring of the hind wings, which contains a dark transverse band. In the very closely related red-winged wasteland insect ( Oedipoda germanica ), this wing mark is bright red. The rails ( tibia ) of the hind legs can also have a slight blue color.
- Color variations
distribution and habitat
This species is the most widespread species of the genus Oedipoda in Europe. Their distribution area covers the entire Mediterranean area and the European continent up to a northern distribution limit in northern Germany, but isolated populations still exist in Denmark and southern Sweden . It is not native to the British Isles ; to the east it may spread as far as Mongolia . In Germany it is more common in the south, in the northwest it is absent in large areas and can only be found on sun-exposed areas. In the area of Aachen in 1987 one was population on a slag heap of coal mining discovered a smoldering there in the last 50 years, the dry the stockpile and keep warm. In Niederlausitz, she is a frequent guest on heathland and in the vicinity of the lignite opencast mines and their remaining holes. It occurs locally in Switzerland and Austria. It is protected all over Europe and is classified as endangered in the Red List of Switzerland and Germany.
The animals prefer dry and warm bare and wasteland areas with very sparse vegetation, such as those found on dry grass , in sand pits or gravel areas. Sometimes they can also be found on very small patches of baldness, but these must be accessible through a clear corridor, such as a fairway or a sand or dry strip. By hiking over these aisles, you can greatly expand your radius of action and living space, especially in midsummer, when more bare areas are created by drying up vegetation. With stable habitat conditions, however, they remain very local.
Way of life
Like the other wasteland terrors, the blue-winged wasteland insect is mainly adapted to life on the ground and moves almost exclusively by walking. Their climbing ability is limited to climbing over small objects, they almost never climb vertical plant structures. For this reason, they avoid more dense vegetation and stay on bare areas. However, they can also fly very well, but mostly only use this for distances of around 10 meters and land on corresponding bare areas after their flights. It feeds on smaller plants on the bare areas and on the edge of the same. No dietary preferences for certain plants were found in feeding experiments; animals eating carrion were also observed in the field.
The escape behavior of the wasteland horror is unique among the jumping horror. They largely rely on their camouflage through the coloring and accordingly crouch on the ground as an escape reflex instead of jumping away like other horrors. Only at a very short escape distance do they jump off and fly a few meters. Just before landing, they hit a sharp hook and after landing they crouch again near stones or other structures. Experiments have also shown that the wasteland terrors prefer to stay on a surface that corresponds to their color.
Mating behavior and oviposition
Unlike many other short- and long-feeler terrors , the blue-winged wasteland terrors have no courtship behavior that precedes a mating. The males do not produce advertising chants and instead actively search the area for females. Once they have found a female, there may be a brief chirp , but the rule is that the males simply move towards the females and mount them. If the female is willing to mate, it allows this to happen, in the other case it fends off the male with kicks.
An interesting observation with this species is that the males apparently only have a very imprecise picture of what their females look like. For this reason, they also try to mate with other female locusts or simply with pieces of wood or other objects that they find on their search. They only realize their mistake when climbing. It also happens that several males want to copulate with a female at the same time and thus hinder each other when climbing. The females usually react after a short time with unwillingness to mate and repel the males with their hind legs.
The eggs are laid in the ground by the female shortly after mating, using the ovipositor to bury her abdomen deep into the earth. The eggs overwinter and the nymphs hatch in the spring of the following year. The development takes place in the males over four, in the females over five molting stages , whereby the coloring of the skin with the molting approximates the coloring of the underground.
supporting documents
- ^ Red list of the grasshoppers of Brandenburg. In: Nature conservation and landscape maintenance in Brandenburg. 8 (1), 1999 ( PDF ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice .; 299 kB).
- ↑ R. Höhnen, R. Klatt: Provisional distribution atlas of the grasshoppers of Brandenburg. In: Märkische Entomologische Nachrichten. 1 (2000), ISSN 1438-9665 , pp. 1-72.
- ^ I. Landeck, D. Wiedemann: The Geradflüglerfauna (Dermaptera, Orthoptera) of the Niederlausitz mining landscape - a contribution to the ecology and distribution of the species. In: Articulata. 13 (1), pp. 81-100.
literature
- Josef Szij: Europe's jumping horrors. Die Neue Brehm-Bücherei Volume 652, Westarp-Wissenschaften, Hohenwarsleben 2004, ISBN 3-894-32910-6 .
- Heinrich Tauscher: Our locusts. Kosmos Franckh'sche Verlagshandlung, Stuttgart 1986, ISBN 3-440-05617-1 .
- Heiko Bellmann: Locusts: observe, determine. Naturbuch Verlag, 1993, ISBN 3-894-40028-5 .
- Heiko Bellmann: grasshoppers. The voices of 61 native species. CD, Amp Europe 2004, ISBN 3-935-32948-2 .
- Siegfried Ingrisch, Günther Köhler: The locusts of Central Europe. Westarp Sciences, 1998, ISBN 3-894-32461-9 .
- Peter Detzel: Locusts in Baden-Württemberg. Ulmer Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-800-13507-8 .
