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Axe-head cicada

Oxypleura sp.

Photo by dotun55
Published on Project Noah
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9.60004, 7.99997

Field Notes

Description:

A cicada, including the 17-year locust, is an insect of the order Hemiptera, suborder Auchenorrhyncha, in the superfamily Cicadoidea, with large eyes wide apart on the head and usually transparent, well-veined wings. There are about 2,500 species of cicada around the world, and many of them remain unclassified. Cicadas live in temperate-to-tropical climates where they are among the most-widely recognized of all insects, mainly due to their large size and unique sound. Cicadas are often colloquially called locusts, although they are unrelated to true locusts, which are a kind of grasshopper. Cicadas are related to leafhoppers and spittlebugs.

Notes:

I first read about the cicada in a dictionary years ago. There was no picture so I had no idea of what it looked like. Also, I often confused it with the katydid, another insect which had a similar description and whose picture I had not seen too. Until now, I had always presumed that every click-click sound coming from the bush was made by a cricket.

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