Colorful Katydids
Nothing in Biology is ever as simple as it seems. That’s the beauty of it, and this is especially true whenever insects enter the picture. Last June, I was scouting out my backyard for insects and other things, and came across a small, brightly-colored insect: vivid green and orange, it was almost neon. So what did I do? I snapped two pictures of it and moved on, not thinking much of it. Scudderia sp. on a leaf of Vitis sp. Obviously I wasn’t thinking very well that day. Returning to the pictures a little while later, I started to investigate to figure out what exactly it was. Truthfully, when I first saw it, I thought it was an assassin bug nymph. Actually, it’s a nymph of a bush katydid, genus Scudderia. An easy way to identify a Scudderia nymph is from their white and black-banded antennae. Unfortunately, that’s about as far as I’ve gotten with this particular nymph. According to Bugguide, there are eight species of Scudderia (in North America at least). Ohio has five of...