Ant-mimicking Mole Cricket
Size 9mm. This animal was crawling around like one of the omni-present green headed ants. It looks similar with its green-blue shining thorax. It was actually readily jumping to the extent that I was not sure if it was a spider. I was collecting crushed concrete from our garden concrete crushing site. I must have disturbed its home, that was probably in and under the crushed concrete. It crawled under small rocks, but was out for quite some time. It even met an ant, with no interest from either party. As for the identification: I did not find an exact match and therefore my ID is tentative. The animal certainly has a double tail, long hind legs with orange-brown joints. Its front legs are massive, short and close to its bulky head. The eyes are small. Chewing parts are quite large. The antennae are relatively long, consisting of many small segments and the end of the antennae gradually lighter in colour. Based on the large digging front legs, I believe that this might be a mole cricket. The animal also resembles a katydid shown on ALA. Based on its rather small size and its hidden lifestyle, I am tempted to believe that there are not many picture representations of this species, if any. I did not handle this fast and readily jumping animal, and could not spend more time with it.
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