Petite southern cricket
| Petite southern cricket | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Chirping of a dainty southern cricket |
||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Pachytrachis gracilis | ||||||||||||
| ( Brunner von Wattenwyl , 1861) |
The petite southern hedge ( Pachytrachis gracilis ) is a long- feeler hedge from the subfamily of the Tettigoniinae within the superfamily of the leaf locust .
features
The petite southern cricket is similar in body to the striped southern cricket , but due to its color it can hardly be confused with it. The abdomen is long and narrow, the pronotum is slightly elongated backwards and covers large parts of the short wings. The strong legs have short black spines on the lower legs, which are larger on the front pairs of legs and are further apart. The basic color ranges from whitish gray to light gray-brown or yellow-brown. The body is covered by a pattern similar to that of the Striped Southern Cricket, but it is very pale and blurred. Above and in front of the eye there is a dark reddish or brown spot, which is divided backwards by a whitish line. From the front edge of the pronotum, a wide, pale brown band extends broadly over the pronotum side lobes to the back of the pronotum and the abdomen, where it slowly dissolves and disintegrates into dark spots or points. This band can be more or less strong, it can be completely absent or it can also be colored dark brown-black. The belly is whitish. There are dark brown horizontal lines on the thighs, the other pairs of legs are darkly dotted on the thighs. The joint regions of the legs are dark. The first and last phalanges are dark brown. The yellow-brown compound eyes have a dark point in the middle. The male's cerci are long, straight, and imperforate. The ovipositor of the female is unusually long and largely straight, it is only slightly curved upwards in the rear half and has a slight downward gradation at its tip. The body length is 14 to 19 millimeters.
Way of life and distribution
The graceful southern hedge is often found on bushes. It occurs on long grassy meadows, on the edges of forests, in bushes and other heavily overgrown areas. Their distribution area extends from southern Austria and South Tyrol via Slovenia , Croatia , Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia and Montenegro to Albania . Adults occur from July to October.
swell
Web links
- Fauna Europaea - Pachytrachis gracilis
- pyrgus.de - Pachytrachis gracilis with photos
- Orthoptera Species File
literature
- Heiko Bellmann: The Cosmos Locust Leader. Determine the species of Central Europe with certainty. Franckh-Kosmos Verlags GmbH & Co. KG, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3440104478