Download Greetings, BugFans, Katydids are classified in the Order Orthoptera

Greetings, BugFans,
Katydids are classified in the Order Orthoptera ("straight wings") and in the Family Tettigoniidae, the
Long-horned Grasshoppers and Katydids. In order to belong to this club, your antennae have to be as
long as or longer than your body. These are large, beautiful, green (brown and pink morphs also exist),
insects of grasslands, open woods and edges whose often ventriloquistic calls can be heard both day and
night.
The BugLady suspects that these photos are (mostly) of
bush katydids in the genus Scudderia, but she is not going
to climb out any farther on the taxonomic limb than that.
Male bush katydids are hard to tell apart, and the evenmore-difficult-to-identify females are known by the
company they keep.
Sue Hubbell, in Broadsides from the Other Orders,
discusses the origin of the word "Katydid." "Katy" is an
olde word for "a wanton," and there are associated folk
stories/songs about wronged and vengeful women and what they did about it, and katy-did/didn't echoed
society's debates about their (alleged) guilt. But John Bartram, explorer of the American southeast and
contemporary of Ben Franklin, called this insect the "Catedidst," an allusion to "catachesis" or "instruction
by word of mouth," which in turn comes from a Greek word meaning "to resound" or "to din in one's
ears." Ah, the etymology of entomology. One entomologist quoted by Hubbell suggests adopting a family
name Katydididae, but no one has taken him up on it yet.
During mating, the male passes a bubble-like sperm packet (spermatophore)
to the female; along with his genetic material, this contains protein for her to
feast on and use in the development of her eggs. These packets are
"expensive;" according to Kaufman and Eaton in the Field Guide to Insects of
North America. The male "spends" as much as 40% of his body weight
producing them, and after he hands over a spermatophore, he grazes avidly.
Hubbell says that during hard times, when vegetation is sparse, females
actively pursue the suddenly-shy males. Because of the high cost (his
physiological investment is greater than hers), he is not a wanton.
In late summer or fall, eggs are deposited in or on vegetation via ovipositors
that are long and saber-like or short and sickle-like, and they hatch the
following spring. Katydids, like other members of the grasshopper clan, practice Simple/Incomplete
metamorphosis, and newly hatched nymphs look like their elders and eat the same foods (katydid 8).
Most katydids nosh on vegetation, but some species are predaceous on other insects, and cannibalism is
not unknown. Nymphs lack the adults' wings and reproductive organs; these gradually appear as the
nymph grows and sheds, and males start to sing as they become sexually mature. The BugLady guesses
that the katydid doing chin-ups had shed recently, and that it has only a few more molts before
adulthood. Its wings extend almost half the length of its abdomen.
Being large, abundant, harmless and tasty, and in spite of their excellent camouflage (well, except for the
pink ones. Check out the picture in Eaton and Kaufman's Field Guide to Insects of North America), they
are an important food for birds, including owls and kestrels, and for rodents, spiders and other insects.
Male katydids are all about sound (in some species, the female
answers, but not loudly). And if their hind set of wings is
dedicated to flight, their front pair was made for song. This they
accomplish by stridulation (friction), rubbing the rigid edge of one
forewing against a comb-like "file" on the other. What they
produce may not sound like the classic "katy-did, katy didn't;" that
song is limited to a single genus of "True Katydids." Fork-tailed
Bush Katydids are the best singers of the "false katydids", with a
repertoire of clicks and buzzes. Because those who produce sound
must be able to hear it, katydids have a slit-like "ear" (tympana)
on each front leg. To pick up sound, they raise a leg in a gesture that is reminiscent of humans cupping
their hand behind an ear.
Calls are designed to attract females of your own species and minimize
attraction by other species, and yet if katydids were classified by calls
alone, more species would be listed than when they are separated
strictly by physical characteristics.
Hubbell says that Katydids challenge us to reevaluate our concept of
"sound," because in addition to the clicks and buzzes, some kinds of
katydids have an ultra-ultrasonic call, while others produce, by
thumping/stamping on twigs in species-specific tempos, vibrations that
are detected by other katydids. For many insects there is no line
between "heard" and "felt," and the vocabulary of our sensory
experience may be inadequate to express theirs.
The BugLady