Elegant Grasshopper

Pests of Field Crops in Southern Africa

ELEGANT GRASSHOPPER

(Orthoptera: Pyrgomorphidae)

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Text Box: These strikingly coloured grasshoppers, Zonocerus elegans, reach up to 50 mm in length, and may or may not have fully developed wings. The head is black with yellow spots and stripes, orange eyes, and antennae alternately striped in black and orange, the prothorax blue-grey with yellow edgings, and the abdomen striped in yellow, black and blue. The wings are mostly reddish. This grasshopper has good reason to “advertise” its presence – the body contains foul-tasting fluids which when emitted have an unpleasant smell, and presumably taste. This bright colouring, known as aposematic colouring, is designed to discourage would-be predators. The juvenile stages resemble the adults to an extent, but are mostly patterned in black with yellow and white spots and stripes, and may be found in congregated groups in the bushveld. TOP

This is a polyphagous pest, and recorded on cotton, soyabeans, groundnuts, deciduous fruit trees and other broad-leaved crops as well as graminaceous crops.

The nymphs and adults eat the leaves, leaving them with ragged edges, but the pest is only sporadically serious, usually being almost solitary within crops, and inflicting little damage.

Text Box: Eggs are laid in batches of 30 to 100 in March to April in a frothy substance buried in loose soil. Hatching only occurs after the winter is over, in October to November when the first rains appear. The nymphs often congregate, feeding on a variety of plants and passing through five instars in a period of about four months. Adults appear at the beginning of the year and live for three to four months. There is thus only a single generation per year. In some seasons, probably due to climatic conditions, elegant grasshopper appears to be much more abundant than usual. TOP

Text Box: When needed, control is usually by the application of contact insecticides such as carbaryl, which may be applied in spot sprays. TOP

Adult elegant grasshopper, note wings not fully developed (above) and juvenile (below).