Meconema thalassinum

Common oak cricket ( Meconema thalassinum ) ♂

The common oak cricket ( Meconema thalassinum, also Meconema varium ) belongs to the superfamily of katydids ( Tettigonioidea ) in the subordination of the long horned grasshoppers ( Ensifera ).

Features

The common oak cricket has grown 1-1.5 cm. This kind of looks like a smaller, paler version of the Green Heupferdes. The sensors have about four times the body length (!) And are yellow with brown rings. The front and rear wings protrude just above the abdomen tip out. The abdomen attachments ( Cerci ) are only weakly developed in the female and the male longer and curved inwards, so that it can hold on to females during mating. The females wear a body almost long, slightly curved saber laying. A special feature under the katydids is the lack of Stridulationsorganen both Meconema species.

Dissemination

The common oak cricket has its main range in Central Europe. To the east, it goes to the Caucasus, north reaches its spread to Great Britain and southern Scandinavia, south to northern southern Europe. In the U.S., it was introduced on Long Iceland. In Germany it is neither a distribution limit yet discernible Bestandszu or - decreased.

Habitat

The habitat is generally where oaks or other deciduous trees grow, ie primarily in deciduous forests, gardens, parks and orchards, even within towns. She avoids closed spruce, but also for book monoculture and tree - and shrub- poor areas. The common oak cricket keeps mostly in the treetops on, often sitting on the underside of leaves, only after heavy rains and storms, you can find them on the ground, from where they once again visits the trees. Due to their ability to fly it falls this way easily to colonize new habitats. The animals can also run very fast. You get lost often in homes; because they are nocturnal and are often in the dark to light.

Food

Their food consists entirely of insects, mostly aphids and small caterpillars.

Way of life

The oak horrors have developed a special kind of utterance, namely the drums with his hind legs on tree branches and coarser leaves. In return, they have lost the ability to stridulate. In evolutionary terms, these are a very recent development, not yet occur in the next of kin, the Japanese genus Nipponomeconema.

The relatively large eggs are laid in the bark of deciduous trees or even on different gall wasp gall. The development may take a year or two. The eggs are very drought tolerant, is himself at slip, unlike other katydids, reduced humidity tolerated.