Nature Note #117: August Song

As the summer begins to wind down, the trees buzz and trill with the songs of night-singing insects. As I walked around the backyard recording their sounds with my camera, I thought back to seeing some of the small red-headed tree crickets on the deck earlier in the week. It's too far north for Handsome Trigs (Phyllopalpus puchellus) surely, but they did look very similar to them indeed.

The rather obvious "ch-ch-ch" or "katy-did" sounds are made by a large leaf-mimicking grasshopper called the Common True Katydid (Pterophylla camellifolia). I only started hearing them last week, but already I find it wonderful to fall asleep at night to the sounds of their stuttering courtship song. It's certainly cool enough to leave the windows open now and doing so certainly cools the body, soul, and mood. So here's to a winding down of summer with cooler days, warmer colors, and the ever present smell of cinnamon to come. Until then, lets enjoy the trills and rhythms of these small, but musical insects.