Cicada - Neotibicen similaris

Moved

Moved from Southern Dog Day Cicada.

ID by Bill Reynolds confirmed by Kathy Hill
NOTE:
1st) the opercula are pointed and not evenly rounded
2nd) the head and pronotum contours & ratios are off for davisi
3rd) the lack of infuscation along the veins of tips/wing margin.
4th) color (T. davisi can be brown, but considering 1, 2, & 3 above - this is "similaris"!!)

… John R. Maxwell, 5 April, 2009 - 12:50am

Moved

Moved from Cicadas.

… john and jane balaban, 4 October, 2006 - 8:27pm

Moved

Moved from Cicadas, Hoppers, Aphids and Allies.

… john and jane balaban, 4 October, 2006 - 8:26pm

Tibicen davisi

The very wide head and extremely long opercula (half the length of the abdomen!) indicate the southern dog-day cicada.

… Andy Hamilton, 3 October, 2006 - 10:57am

Tough one

Jim,

At first I thought this was T. canicularis. While the body length is right, the overall length seems longer than a T. canicularis as well as the size of those opercula. Can you measure the wings and opercula?

With regards to the pubescense, some specimens of T. canicularis have it. Check this image here and here.

This is indicative of the specimen only being a few days from teneral and some sources have told me that they eventually loose the hairs as they fly around and knock into things.

I'm going to check back in my data on T. canicularis and see if I have any at this overall length.

… Gerry Bunker, 1 September, 2006 - 10:22pm

Response

Each operculum (which I presume are the two large plates covering the anterior portion of the abdomen's underside) is 1.1 cm in length and 0.8 cm in width. The wing length is 4.1 cm. By the way, this cicada was found on the side of my house, so he may have just come out of the ground. I presume "few days from teneral" refers to being a fresh adult? Thanx.

… Jim Barrett, 2 September, 2006 - 7:52am

Too large

Yes teneral is the condition of a freshly molted insect. I think what is happening here is that it is too teneral. So it doesn't have its full colors yet. The measurements of the opercula are very large for T. canicularis and 11 mm seems too large even for T. linnei. It is Tibicen though :)

Maybe Andy can ID it.

… Gerry Bunker, 2 September, 2006 - 1:05pm