Red-legged grasshopper
The red-legged grasshopper has a reddish-brown back, a greenish-yellow belly and bright red back legs. It is one of the most common grasshoppers in North America. You can find it hopping in fields and long grass.
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Fun facts
The mum lays her eggs in autumn just under the soil. The babies dig their way up in spring.
A young grasshopper changes its skin five to seven times before it gets working wings.
In cold places in the north, red-legged grasshoppers grow up smaller, because summer there is short.
When spiders are around, it eats more sugary plant food and its body works faster.
When there are very many of them, they can damage crops like wheat, soybeans and alfalfa.
Most asked questions about Red-legged grasshopper
?What does a red-legged grasshopper eat?
Grasses, leafy plants and shrubs, and sometimes flowers, fruit and bark.
?How big is a red-legged grasshopper?
The boys are about 1.7 to 2.4 centimetres long and the girls about 1.8 to 3 centimetres.
?Can red-legged grasshoppers fly?
Yes. The grown-ups have wings that reach past the end of their body.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Melanoplus femurrubrum
- Named by
- De Geer, 1773
- Group
- Grasshoppers and crickets
- Family
- Acrididae
- Classification
- Insecta > Orthoptera > Acrididae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Melanoplus femurrubrum (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Rhododendrites. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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