Today I encountered a sure sign of summer- the wet feeling
of spit on my legs as I walked through some plants. Spittlebugs are out!
Spittlebugs are the nymphs of froghoppers, which are insects in the superfamily
Cercopoidea. While I don’t particularly love the feeling of spit on my leg,
this ingenious protection that the nymphs produce helps to hide them from
predators, insulates them against heat and cold, and prevents them from drying
out. As we see the spit of the nymphs on plant stems, the nymphs are busy
piercing the plants and sucking the sap, fortunately causing little damage to
the plant. While we’re all used to bumping into the spittlebugs, it’s also
worth keeping our eyes open for the adult froghoppers who can jump amazing
distances (100 times their length) to get from plant to plant!
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