Common Green Grasshopper

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 On a sunny day at this time of the year you don't have to walk far in our meadow without hearing the noise of a grasshopper. This call is produced by "stridulation" rubbing the legs against a comb like structure. Finding where the noise is coming from is a different matter and it requires a little patience. You have a better chance of spotting them when they move a few metres.


The only thing that one might confuse with a grasshopper is a cricket.  Crickets have much longer antennae and stridulate by rubbing their wings together rather than using their legs.
Apparently grasshoppers are more common in the North of the country than the South (less intensive farming??) The link here from the RSPB site gives a good description of the differences between crickets and grasshoppers. RSPB - Grasshoppers

Diary.
Camera traps showed a couple of foxes in the bog meadow. We had a good sighting of a stoat running past the conservatory window yesterday. A female I think. It seems to me that the big males are a lot less likely to visit us here - or are more nocturnal ( although I am not seeing them on the camera traps.) I have just noticed that the spotted fly catcher has started another brood in the same nest as earlier in the year. 4 eggs in the nest so far.


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