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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Grasshoppers, Crickets, Katydids (Orthoptera) » Long-horned Orthoptera (Ensifera) » Crickets (Gryllidea) » True Crickets (Gryllidae) » Tree Crickets (Oecanthinae) » Common Tree Crickets (Oecanthus) » Nigricornis Group (Oecanthus Nigricornis Group) » Forbes' Tree Cricket (Oecanthus forbesi)
Photo#329633
Spermatophore - Oecanthus forbesi - female
Copyright © 2009 Wisconsin Oecanthinancy

Spermatophore - Oecanthus forbesi - Female
Racine, Racine County, Wisconsin, USA
September 6, 2009
Size: 1-2mm
This female was collected from a milkweed plant. First time I've found Oecanthinae on milkweed. It would be impossible to ID her by visual alone -- she mated with a male (also collected on milkweed in the same field) -- whose song had 72 pulses per second at 26.3 degrees Centigrade. That makes him Oecanthus forbesi. (An Oecanthus nigricornis is VERY similar in appearance, but calls with a pulses per second rate in the 50's at that same temperature).

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Spermatophore - Oecanthus forbesi - female Spermatophore - Oecanthus forbesi - female
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Contributed by Wisconsin Oecanthinancy on 6 September, 2009 - 8:48pm
Last updated 6 September, 2009 - 10:31pm

Thats wonderful how you can
tell them apart simply by that data alone. Incredible!

I assume the 'Spermatophore' is supposed to fall off afterwards? I have seen one of my Gryllus females with two of these... Despite their constant mating they don't seem to be producing any eggs
… Vespula Vulgaris, 12 September, 2009 - 9:51pm login or register to post comments

 
Tree cricket females eat the spermaophore sac
I've seen them do some acrobatic worthy bending to pluck the spermatophore off with their mouth.

This is reportedly the reason the male continues to sing after the spermatophore has been inserted. As the female is distracted by continuing to eat from the metanotal gland, the sperm has more time to transfer from the sac to the female -- before she eats the sac.

In regard to the pulse rates and temperature relationship...I have learned SO much from Dr. Thomas J. Walker (UF at Gainesville -- and author of the SINA site.)
… Wisconsin Oecanthinancy, 13 September, 2009 - 7:54pm login or register to post comments

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