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Photo#14624
Pygmy Grasshopper - Tetrix subulata

Pygmy Grasshopper - Tetrix subulata
Harvard, Worcester County, Massachusetts, USA
April 8, 2005
Size: <1/2"

Moved

It is Tetrix subulata
The shape of the fastigium is different, and in T. arenosa the top of the pronotum is even more flat and the ridge even less prominent (it is actually pretty strong in this individual).

Likely Tetrix, possibly T. arenosa
Helfer, How to Know the Grasshoppers (1) describes several genera/species of this family in detail. For example, key on p. 88 reads: Pronotum with median ridge feeble, surface depressed, nearly flt Tetrix arenosus. Description reads: "grayish, brownish, or blackish, sometimes with a large whitish area across widest part of pronotum."

That part of the key and the description seem to match your photo. I think the genus is pretty sure, and the species likely. I've got a photo of what I think is the same critter from North Carolina, but it had no white patch.

Patrick Coin
Durham, North Carolina

 
Tetrix sounds like the descri
Tetrix sounds like the description is right. I've got about 7 others in the Pygmy Grasshopper section that are all the same size and shape as this, with different dorsal patterns. Do you think they all might be Tetrix species?

 
Perhaps Tetrix!
Yes, I saw some of your photos, and some do look like what I think is Tetrix, based on Helfer's keys. I had just singled out this one because of the big white patch, which is described by Helfer. Only problem is that reference is old and these are real variable critters. (Eric Eaton has rightly cautioned me on that.) However the key also seems to agree with photos of this family at Insects of Cedar Creek, so I have some confidence in it. At some point I'll sit down and document all of this for one of my photos, try to summarize the characters in that family, and I'll try to make some plausible assignments, at least to genus. I can try to get a friend who is good with orthoptera to look at them as well. He's got a working checklist of orthoptera for North Carolina, which should be helpful as well.

If anybody finds any more recent keys for the family, I'd like to know about them.

Patrick Coin
Durham, North Carolina

 
More on T. arenosa
Several comments in Helfer (1) suggest this is Tetrix arenosa: flat pronotum with feeble median ridge (supposedly differentiates from others of the genus) and the broad white band--the only species for which Helfer mentions this character. Photos of several members of this genus in Bland, Orthoptera of Michigan (2) show the feebly-ridged pronotum, and so do photos at Insects of Cedar Creek. See my photo:



So, all-in-all, I think This is Tetrix arenosa. I wrote a guide page, if you care to move your photo there.

Patrick Coin
Durham, North Carolina

 
T. arenosa
Moved to the new page you made. Thanks for all the help Patrick.

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