Coneheaded Katydid

It’s always fun to find something you’ve never found before. This is my first Coneheaded Katydid, found in a large area of Big Bluestem. When I look at that head, I can’t help thinking about prawns.

This discovery caused me to get out one of my identification guides. I chose the one with the pictures. When identifying something new, my preferred sequence is pictures, range maps, descriptions. The pictures only showed two brown katydids, but the range maps said they weren’t even close to this area. According to the text, color wasn’t important, so I had to work with markings and shape.

I’m pretty sure this is the Robust Conehead, the most common species in this area. The final characteristic I needed to check was the song and this guy didn’t stay around to sing for me.

This individual flew up from the grass near the conehead. This might be a Common Virtuoso Katydid, but there are too many characteristics, including the song, that I can’t glean from this photo. I only got this one shot before the katydid took off and flew higher into the tree. These encounters just reinforce the fact that there are a lot of things at Blue Jay Barrens that I don’t know. I’d hate to think there could be a time when I knew this place so well that I could find no more surprises.