The Leichhardt's Grasshopper, Australia's most beautiful insect. 🧡
Today is National Threatened Species Day and I want to take a moment to reflect on the conservation of invertebrates in Australia. 🔎☀️
Australia is one of the most biodiverse places on earth, but also boasts an unfortunately high amount of threatened species. Many of these listed threatened species include charismatic larger animals such as mammals and birds, but did you know that hardly any invertebrates are listed? 🪲🐛❌
Many of the invertebrates you see me post are extremely understudied, many without even names let alone anything known about their ecology! ✏️
Invertebrates are the building blocks of all our eco-systems, acting as nutrient cyclers, a food source for all larger animals and extremely important pollinators. We depend on them for our own survival. 👊
The Leichhardt's Grasshopper is unfortunately a great example of an insect in decline. Like many invertebrate species, it only occurs in a small area which pushes its risk of disappearing. Only living and feeding on Pityrodia shrubs on the escarpments of Arnhem Land, population sizes have declined due to a changed fire regime, with some populations now locally extinct. 🔥
These grasshoppers are also culturally significant to the Indigenous people of the Western Arnhem Land. 'Alyurr' is the name given to this hopper, a child of the lightning man Namarrgon, with its appearance sparking the start of the annual wet season. ⛈️
The Leichhardt's Grasshopper is a spectacular species and we still have lots to learn about it and even though it is declining, is not on the threatened species list. How many other invertebrates who aren't as big and colourful are disappearing before our eyes and we haven't even blinked?