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Hello,
I have a photo of a type of grass hopper and was wondering is it native to Western Australia and if it is what’s the grass hoppers name?
Nyssa Henderson
Hi Nyssa,
We couldn’t locate your Grasshopper on Geocities, but we thought it resembled the Pyrgomorphidae species we have identified in South Africa. That was a good hunch as this turns out to be a Blistered Grasshopper, Monistria pustulifera, also known as the Inland Painted Grasshopper. The Australian Insect Website states: “The blistered grasshopper (or pyrgomorph) belongs to the family Pyrgomorphidae. This family has some of the smallest and some of the largest grasshoppers in Australia. The pustulifera species can grow up to 65mm in length. This short horned grasshopper has a mottled body, with orange-yellow spots all over.” South African Pyrgomorphs are toxic because they feed on milkweed. The same may be true of the Blistered Grasshopper. Thanks for adding a new Australian species to our site. It is rare for us to get Australian submissions during Northern Hemisphere summer, or perhaps the shear volume of American submissions at that time causes us to overlook letters from down under.
I found this kind of insect in my work place in Mardie, Pilbara, WA.
Sometimes it has 2 red bubbles on its back when it is touched. Some of this insect don’t have 2 read bubbles. The name might come from the bubbles, Blistered?
Hi Charles those red bubbles are most likely the 2nd pr of wings which are very small and are covered by the first pair of wings. Even though these are flightless insects they use their wings to flash the red 2nd pr of wings to scare predators away hence why you saw the red when they were touched.
Cheers
Shaun