This flew into me and my girlfriends bedroom last night, we were quite fascinated by it as we have never seen anything quite like it before. Could you please help us identify this stunningly unusual creature....? It reminds me of some sort of Locust, cricket, crustacean and grasshopper hybrid... Bizarre..!?! Thanks, Blizzah29 ::)
Blizzah29
this is not the place to ask for identifications, we have an Insect and Spider Identification Forum here: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/f/bugid/all/ where you would have a good chance of getting your insect identified.
Having said that, I do know your strange insect. It is known as a Mole Cricket, a Gryllotalpa species, quite possibly Gryllotalpa monanka: http://davesgarden.com/guides/bf/go/313/
or perhaps the Common Mole Cricket - Gryllotalpa pluvialis: http://www.brisbaneinsects.com/brisbane_grasshoppers/MoleCricket.htm
These strange insects spend most of their time underground, having strong digging front legs. WE often hear them singing from under the soil, especially on a wet evening,
Ken
Thanks for the info Ken, it turns out that it is the Gryllotalpa monanka ( Dark Night Mole Cricket ) .... Now I'm curious as to where it's Native origins are...? This one that I took the photo of was found in my room Western Australia in the city of Melville.
Blizzah29
I looked in the book "Grasshopper Country", which provides quite a bit of information on the Mole Crickets. There are apparently about 10 species of Gryllotalpa in Australia. It doesn't say much about distributions, but it does say thay G. monanka "is a widespread species that can be found in such disparate localities as Canberra, ACT and Alice Springs, NT". So it may well range from here in Churchill, Victoria to Melville in WA.
Ken
Surprising as I have lived in W.A. almost my whole 31 years of my life and never encountered one of these awsome little guys before, btw this one must have been female as it "flew" into our room. You would think out of 31 years you would have encountered it sometime before... Oh well, guess not.
Cheers Ken!
