29-Jul London’s Chirping Chorus: Grasshoppers & Crickets Decoded

If you want to try and identify an unseen grasshopper purely by its call, it is necessary to time it and also the spaces between the chirps. The call of the meadow grasshopper Chorthippus parallelus, which is one of the most commonly heard, has a gap of between one and three seconds. It is produced irregularly and is also slightly scratchy. The field grasshopper C. brunneus produces a series of short, brisk chirps or ‘zips’ for only one or two seconds. The mottled grasshopper Myrmeleotettix maculatus is usually heard on heaths rather than rough grassland. It produces perhaps twenty short, repeated chirps, which start off short and quiet and then get louder and louder. The common green grasshopper Omecestus viridulus has a more rattling call, which gradually increases in volume lasting for around ten seconds.

The calls of the stripe-winged grasshopper Stenobothrus lineatus are more wheezy in character, lasting between ten and twenty seconds and lastly, the rufous grasshopper Gomphocerippus rufus quietly stridulates continuously for about five or six seconds. During this period the sound it makes fluctuates. There are many more ticking noises these insects produce as well as louder and more adventurous courting calls and they also occasionally twitter and almost seem to have conversations with each other.

The long horned grasshoppers or bushy crickets have their own medley of different songs. Roesel’s bush cricket Metrioptera roeselii is one of the easiest to recognise. It is a high-pitched, soft but continuous reeling. It may go on for several minutes and unusually doesn’t normally stop as you approach. The dark bush cricket Pholidoptera griseoaptera produces three rough chirps in quick succession that are then repeated every six seconds.

Bog bush crickets Metrioptera brachyptera usually sing in the evening. Theirs is a thin sound of five or six notes per second produced with constant pitch and pace. The most magnificent family member is the great green bush cricket Tettigonia viridissima which has a very loud, high-pitched penetrating call, which stops abruptly once you get near.

The oak bush cricket Meconema thalassinum is usually the one that occasionally wanders into our houses. They are favourites due to their vivid lime colour and gentle behaviour. Although they drum their legs on the ground, we cannot hear them.

The speckled bush cricket Leptophyes punctatissima is similarly silent, although sometimes you can hear a faint, intermittent sound. However, they are speckled and plump and because of this they occasionally get noticed in trees or among nettles. The coneheads are a group often only heard by children. Both the long and short-winged conehead produce very high-pitched buzzing noises.

The short-winged conehead Conocephalus dorsalis produces a very faint whirring sound which might just be heard near ponds or salt marshes. It has a slight hissing quality and this sound can be alternated with some rapid ticking. The long-winged conehead C. discolor is similar but slightly louder. It is said to be like listening to a very distant great green bush cricket if that helps. Until relatively recently, house crickets Acheta domesticus were extremely common in London houses, until modern hygiene practices eradicated them. Their short, shrill, regular bursts were intermittent throughout the night and were often a source of comfort to the inhabitants.

Groundhoppers tend to be smaller and a darker brown than grasshoppers. They also have a distinctive hood stretching from the thorax which partially covers their forewings.

Although they make no noise, the slender ground hopper Tetrix subulata may be found in the Lea Valley and the common groundhopper T. undulata may still occur on Ashtead Common. Good places to listen for grasshoppers generally are Epping Forest, Richmond Park and Thamesmead Marshes and bush crickets may be heard at Bookham Common, Oxshott and Cornmill meadows.