I first saw this insect at the beginning of the summer. As I was working in my garden, it startled me when it flew into the air with an erratic leap. I of course hadn't seen the grasshopper because it was so well camouflaged with the rocks that it sat on top of. As you can see in the bottom of this photo, the grasshopper almost perfectly matches the pebbles that are in my garden. It wasn't until the end of August while I was on the phone with Matt that I was finally able to get a photo. It turns out that these grasshoppers can be quite shy. Any time that I would go to take a photo, they would leap away. If it wasn't sunny out, they were nowhere to be found. If it was rainy or windy, I wouldn't see a single one. Thankfully I was able to get this photo just in time for our September gallery!

What do Carolina grasshoppers look like?

Carolina grasshoppers are known for their large size. They can grow to be 58mm in length, and the females are 80-102mm across with their wings spread out. For that reason, they are often mistaken as butterflies. They come in a variety of colors: shades of gray, tan, brown, and green. The matching color of this grasshopper to its environment serves as a great defense mechanism to the birds that find them to be a quite nutritious food.