Yes, Orthoptera. Grasshoppers, locusts, crickets, bush crickets - all that good stuff.
In today's post, I collected most insects from the order Orthoptera, which I photographed from 2007 to 2009 using the Canon EOS 350D camera, the 100mm f/2.8 Macro lens, and the Canon Macro Ring Lite MR-14.
Ah, those were the times. Despite not being present on any social network, I felt more socialized than now. Social networks with their fabricated, often exaggerated emotionality, their strong tendency to elevate banality, and a myriad of morronic written & unwritten rules regurarely wake up a sociopath in me.
This is the Psophus stridulus, commonly known as the Rattle grasshopper.
I took these photographs relatively far from home ...
... in the mountains about a hundred kilometers from where I live.
That area near the border with Slovenia is the nearest place I can find this species.
Psophus stridulus from the Acrididae family is a fairly big, sturdy grasshopper ...
... that lives mainly in arid and rocky open areas.
Mountains are its ideal habitat. In the following photograph ...
... you can see a Rattle grasshopper cleaning its eyes.
This is a bush cricket ...
... a member of the Tettigoniidae family.
The name of the species is Poecilimon ornatus.
You can also call it the Ornate Bright Bush Cricket, if you wish.
Different colors inside the same species are fairly common among bush crickets and locusts. In the following photograph ...
... you can see a greener Ornate Bright Bush Cricket.
This one looks like it could be perfectly camouflaged among the exuberant green vegetation in springtime and early summer, while the Poecilimon ornatus I introduced earlier ...
... seems ready to hide in the slightly yellowish foliage decorated with different dots and stains typical for the late summer and early autumn.
I photographed both morphs the same day.
On the 23rd of June 2009.
That's why you can see them next to each other, posing on the same branch in this shot.
To encounter this species ...
... I have to drive at least forty kilometers ...
... to the deciduous woods in the central, inland parts of Istria.
As you can see in this long series of photographs dedicated to just one species ...
... Poecilimon ornatus is a big, fat insect with extremely reduced wings unusable for flying or assisting long elegant jumps.
These bush crickets jump around like clumsy little frogs.
In this and the following seventeen shots ...
... you can follow ...
... the molting of another species from the Tettigoniidae family.
It's the Platycleis intermedia ...
... commonly known as the Intermediate Grey Bush Cricket ...
... a considerably smaller, elegant Orthopteran ...
... with well developed wings.
These agile bush crickets can do long jumps and short flights when the occasion requires it.
The Intermediate Grey Bush Crickets are very common in my area.
I often see them jumping all around the meadows on the outskirts of my hometown.
This is a very small, young nymph ...
... of a very common grasshopper.
A grasshopper so common on the dry summer meadows that is commonly known as the Common Straw Grasshopper.
Here you can see a young grasshopper posing on the ear of grass. The nymph shown in the following photograph...
... is older and bigger. It looks quite different but it belongs to the same species.
Here you can see the same scene lit differently.
The nymph posing in this series of four photographs is even bigger, with considerably longer, more developed wings.
This insect is very close to its adult stage.
The scientific name of the species is Euchorthippus declivus. It belongs to the Acrididae family.
In this series of six photographs, the grasshopper is posing on the fallen leaves.
Here you can see the same grasshopper from a different angle.
This adult male Common Straw Grasshopper was photographed in a very different light.
I didn't use the flash this time. It's one of only three photographs taken in natural light you'll see in today's post.
In this shot, you can see a pair of Euchorthippus declivus mating.
Here you can see a colorful bush cricket posing on the soft carpet made of small yellow flowers.
This is a Decticus albifrons nymph.
Decticus albifrons is yet another species from the Tettigoniidae family...
... commonly known as the White-faced Bush Cricket.
The head, the fore legs, and parts of the thorax in these nymphs are usually brown but sometimes, fairly rarely in my experience, are vivid red or pink.
Here you can see the young, small, and partially pink nymph ...
... of the Meadow Grasshopper from the Acrididae family.
The scientific name of the species ...
... is Pseudochorthippus parallelus.
I took these photographs in the juicy tall grass near the river, the preferred habitat of the Meadow Grasshoppers. It was in the northern part of Istria, about eighty or ninety kilometers from where I live.
Pseudochorthippus parallelus can't be found in my area.
This is the Platycleis albopunctata ...
... commonly known ...
... as the Grey Bush cricket.
The family is Tettigoniidae ...
... of course.
It's a very common species in my area.
Through this shitload of similar photographs, You can see the same bush cricket in jut a few poses but lit differently from picture to picture.
This is a nymph ...
... a green, juvenile form ...
... of the Egyptian Bird Grasshopper.
The species belongs to the Acrididae family, its scientific name is Anacridium aegyptium.
At this nymphal stage, the Egyptian Bird Grasshopper can be green, gray, or in a few shades of brown. In the following photograph ...
... you can see one of those brown morphs.
Its color is a vivid, dense brown, very close to the orange.
The white, pearl-like dots on the thorax are nicely pronounced on this color, much more than in the green morph.
A bit of light blue on the eyes is a lovely detail too.
One can be repelled by the whole shape of the insect as much as he or she wants, but the beauty of some colors, patterns and small details is hard to deny.
I had a lot of fun photographing these Anacridium aegyptium nymphs, back then in 2009.
The flash helped me explore different ways in which to light the scene ...
... and accentuate different aspects, different textures and details.
As the nymphs grow ...
... no matter their color ...
... they have to molt.
When that's done ...
... when the old exoskeleton is discarded ...
... you can often see it ...
... hanging upside down on the vegetation. In the following photograph ...
... you can see an adult. Anacridium aegyptium is an impressive grasshopper, the biggest one in my area ...
... and probably in whole Europe.
The fat, colorful bush cricket shown in this and the following four photographs ...
... is the Barbitistes yersini, commonly known as the Balkan Saw Bush Cricket. It belongs to the Tettigoniidae family, of course.
This beautiful green grasshopper from the Acrididae family is the Euthystira brachyptera.
I mean, it's a male Euthystira brachyptera, more precisely.
Here you can see the female.
This lovely set of four photographs showed both the male and the female.
Euthystira brachyptera is commonly known as the Small Gold Grasshopper.
The nearest place where I can see this species is the mountains near the border with Slovenia, about a hundred kilometers from home.
This interesting bush cricket ...
... was photographed on the reeds near the river, in the central part of Istria ...
... about seventy kilometers from where I live ...
... and is a well-developed female nymph not too far from its adult stage.
Here you can see a considerably younger male nymph ...
... with very small wings.
The name of the species is Ruspolia nitidula, it's commonly known as the Large Conehead, and it belongs to the Tettigoniidae family.
This grasshopper has a great camouflage on dry soil, dry vegetation ...
... and other similar surfaces typical for its dry habitat during the summer.
The name of the species is Oedipoda caerulescens ...
... is commonly known as the Blue-winged Grasshopper ...
... and it belongs to the Acrididae family.
These grasshoppers come in various shades of brown and gray, and their markings can be slightly different from individual to individual. If you compare this Oedipoda caerulescens with the one shown in the following photograph ...
... you'll see what I mean.
The Blue-winged Grasshopper is very common in my southern, seaside part of Istria.
I didn't have to drive far ...
... to get these photographs ...
... back then, in 2009.
I had a lot of fun with macrophotography that year.
In the following photograph ...
... you can see a different kind of beast.
Another bush cricket.
This is the Ephippiger discoidalis ...
... from the Tettigoniidae family ...
... a species commonly known as the Dalmatian Saddle Bush cricket.
Here you can see a very young nymph of the same species ...
... posing on the small wild orchid that grows on the sunny meadows near the sea, here in my area.
In this photograph, the insect tries to be invisible while resting on the flower.
Here you can see another portrait of an adult Ephippiger discoidalis.
Pholidoptera griseoaptera, commonly known as the Dark Bush Cricket, is the only species present with no more than one picture in today's post.
The Short-tailed Plump Bush Cricket, scientifically known as Isophya brevicauda, on the other hand is shown through two photographs. In one as a big fat nymph near its adult stage ...
... and in the other as a much smaller and younger one.
This green and brown grasshopper ...
... from the Acrididae family ...
... is commonly known as the Stripe-winged Grasshopper.
The scientific name ...
... of the species ...
... is ...
... Stenobothrus lineatus.
The insect shown in this tryptich is a nymph, a small, juvenile version ...
... of the Tylopsis lilifolia from the Tettigoniidae family.
In this and the previous two photographs, you can see an adult.
Tylopsis lilifolia is commonly known as the Lily Bush Cricket.
The nymph shown in this set of nine shots belongs to a different species from the same Tettigoniidae family. In the following photograph ...
... you can see an adult Acrometopa macropoda, commonly known as the Common Long-legged Bush Cricket, cleaning its antenna.
Acrometopa macropoda is an impressively big bush cricket with impressively long legs and antennae.
When it comes to the Great Green Bush Cricket, another impressively big Tettigoniidae from my area, I can show you only a relatively small nymph.
The scientific name of the species is Tettigonia viridissima.
In this set of nine photographs, you can see the Eastern Banded Grasshopper, a species from the Acrididae family. Its scientific name is Arcyptera microptera.
In the following set of the same number of photographs ...
... you can see another species from the same Acrididae family.
This is the male Cheating Mountain Grasshopper, scientifically known as Odontopodisma decipiens.
This is the Cyrtaspis scutata ...
... yet another species ...
... from the Tettigoniidae family.
Cyrtaspis scutata is commonly known ...
... as ...
... the Shielded Oak Bush Cricket.
Cyrtaspis scutata can be found in my area ...
... but ...
... is pretty rare there.
It's quite common in the woods of the central part of Istria.
That's where I took all these photographs.
Here you can see the very small, young ...
... and practically wingless nymph ...
... of the Barbarian Grasshopper. In the following triptych...
... you can see a paler young nymph of the same species.
This is a much older ...
... and bigger nymph ...
... closer to the adult stage.
The scientific name of the species is Calliptamus barbarus. It belongs to the family Acrididae.
Adults Pezotettix giornae, commonly known as the Common Maquis Grasshopper, look a lot like nymphs of Calliptamus barbarus and some other species from the same Acrididae family.
The following links will take you to the sites with more information about protagonists of today's post. I found some stuff about them there.
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/470524-Psophus-stridulus
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/511093-Poecilimon-ornatus
http://www.pyrgus.de/Platycleis_intermedia_en.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euchorthippus_declivus
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/127182-Decticus-albifrons
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/501625-Pseudochorthippus-parallelus
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/362293-Platycleis-albopunctata
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anacridium_aegyptium
http://www.pyrgus.de/Barbitistes_yersini_en.html
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/340425-Euthystira-brachyptera
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruspolia_nitidula
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/326052-Oedipoda-caerulescens
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/604354-Ephippiger-discoidalis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pholidoptera_griseoaptera
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/783227-Isophya-brevicauda
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stenobothrus_lineatus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tylopsis_lilifolia
https://inaturalist.lu/taxa/933555-Acrometopa-macropoda/browse_photos
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tettigonia_viridissima
http://www.pyrgus.de/Arcyptera_microptera_en.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odontopodisma_decipiens
http://www.pyrgus.de/Cyrtaspis_scutata_en.html
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/367312-Calliptamus-barbarus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pezotettix_giornae
