Convalescing with Grasshoppers
Grasshoppers may be just the challenge Crumby needs. Here’s why. Most grasshoppers need to be caught before they can be identified. So the average sick person needs to put out a little effort. Like you have to stalk the grasshopper. Stalking means walking which is an important type of exercise for the average convalescent as well as a lousy way to get around. You have to swing a butterfly net. You may have to ride a bicycle off to some place outside the CB once you have caught all your own grasshoppers or are afraid you may injure your own grasshoppers. You need to tote a camera.
Yes. There’s a lot to convalescing with grasshoppers. In addition to the above, there’s personal hygiene to consider, always important for an aspiring convalescent. Like you have to trim and wash your nails before you take a picture of your hand holding a grasshopper. That’s right. Nobody needs to see a bunch of dirty, long nails on the hand that holds the grasshopper. Least of all the hands owner.
But why must grasshoppers be caught before they can be identified? Why not just take a picture of an average grasshopper sitting in the dirt and be done with it? Well. You need to catch the grasshopper to determine: 1. Does its pronotum extend over its abdomen? 2. Do the spines on its tibia extend to the apical spurs on both the inner and outer sides? 3. Does it possess a prosternal spine or spur between its forelegs? 4. At what angle does its face and the top of its head meet? 5. Is a stridulatory peg present on its inner hind femur?
As the average presumptive Orthopteralogist may espy, remembering to observe (or take pictures of) all these details on a wriggling hopper may be a real challenge Especially when the convalescent is hopped on Vicodin. Goodness!
Yet we should recall that life without challenge is just that, life without challenge. So maybe life with challenge is better than life without challenge. Or maybe not. Whichever. Anyway, life is life.
Yesterday, convalescent Crumby left the CB on his bike to go catch grasshoppers. But before Crumby could even get on his bike, he had to figure how to accommodate the butterfly net to the bike. This without making the whole rig appear too conspicuous. That proved impossible. Oh well. Uckitfa.
Once Crumby arrived at his destination, Crumby counted the grasshoppers as he stalked them. Eventually, along maybe a half mile of trail, Crumby summed five grasshoppers, all Ardia simplex. Weird! All these grasshoppers are the same kind. This would never happen at the CB where there is actual plant species diversity. Crumby groused.
OK. Here is a picture Crumby took. It features a ventral view of an Ardia simplex grasshopper. Notice the freshly trimmed thumbnail. Of course, this is not the only picture Crumby took of those particular grasshoppers. You need more than one picture to determine photographically the kind of organism we are considering. But this picture is representative of those kinds of shots. See the blue tibias?
Yes. There’s a lot to convalescing with grasshoppers. In addition to the above, there’s personal hygiene to consider, always important for an aspiring convalescent. Like you have to trim and wash your nails before you take a picture of your hand holding a grasshopper. That’s right. Nobody needs to see a bunch of dirty, long nails on the hand that holds the grasshopper. Least of all the hands owner.
But why must grasshoppers be caught before they can be identified? Why not just take a picture of an average grasshopper sitting in the dirt and be done with it? Well. You need to catch the grasshopper to determine: 1. Does its pronotum extend over its abdomen? 2. Do the spines on its tibia extend to the apical spurs on both the inner and outer sides? 3. Does it possess a prosternal spine or spur between its forelegs? 4. At what angle does its face and the top of its head meet? 5. Is a stridulatory peg present on its inner hind femur?
As the average presumptive Orthopteralogist may espy, remembering to observe (or take pictures of) all these details on a wriggling hopper may be a real challenge Especially when the convalescent is hopped on Vicodin. Goodness!
Yet we should recall that life without challenge is just that, life without challenge. So maybe life with challenge is better than life without challenge. Or maybe not. Whichever. Anyway, life is life.
Yesterday, convalescent Crumby left the CB on his bike to go catch grasshoppers. But before Crumby could even get on his bike, he had to figure how to accommodate the butterfly net to the bike. This without making the whole rig appear too conspicuous. That proved impossible. Oh well. Uckitfa.
Once Crumby arrived at his destination, Crumby counted the grasshoppers as he stalked them. Eventually, along maybe a half mile of trail, Crumby summed five grasshoppers, all Ardia simplex. Weird! All these grasshoppers are the same kind. This would never happen at the CB where there is actual plant species diversity. Crumby groused.
OK. Here is a picture Crumby took. It features a ventral view of an Ardia simplex grasshopper. Notice the freshly trimmed thumbnail. Of course, this is not the only picture Crumby took of those particular grasshoppers. You need more than one picture to determine photographically the kind of organism we are considering. But this picture is representative of those kinds of shots. See the blue tibias?
posted by ray pistrum at Thursday, September 06, 2012
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