Grassland Grasshopper
Profile
Ellura
Spotted Bandwing
S9, 5th Instar, dorsal
 
                      
Spotted Bandwing (Qualetta maculata)Class: Animals (Animalia) - Jointed Legs (Arthropoda) - Insects (Insecta)
Order: Crickets, Grasshoppers & Katydids (Orthoptera)
Family: Short-horned Grasshopper (Caelifera: Acrididae)     iNaturalist Observation
Species: Spotted Bandwing (Qualetta maculata)
This Photo:     🔍S6, Early Instar, dorsal🔎

Thank you Matthew Connors for confirming the id of this species for us

General Species Information:
Found on Ellura (in the Murray Mallee, SA), the Riverland and elsewhere
They are known for their thick pronotum (shield on the back). It does vary though. The head is also quite distinctive being quite short but high, with the eyes protruding above the "forehead".
The abdomen is apricot in colour, and the pronotum has varying shades of white to grey.
Thanks to Matthew Connors for picking our miss-id of the nymph. We thought it was Cratilopus; you can see the pronotum shape is wrong for that genus, as well as Cratilopus being flightless.

Copyright © 2017-2024 Brett & Marie Smith. All Rights Reserved. Photographed 25-Mar-2017
This species is an Australian Native Species, not listed in the SA Murray Mallee Survey of 2010.