Tibicen pruinosus in Taylorville, IL

Posted By: Massachusetts Cicadas | On: 2011-07-24 | Website:

Hey Jake,

I had to adjust the brightness of your latest photos. After doing so, I am curious if this specimen may in fact be a T. canicularis or T. davisi cicada. I suspect the former rather than the latter. It may be the adjustment to the photo that I did through Photoshop but can you tell me if you obtained this male specimen while it was calling? T. canicularis/T. davisi cicadas generally run smaller than T. pruinosus but other than that, they look quite similar in the mid-west.

Posted By: Jimmy Wu | On: 2011-07-24 | Website: http://www.youtube.com/user/mantisman630

The coloration is a little bit more like a T. canicularis...here in Kansas the canicularis look a more shiny dark color rather than the more brightly green highlighted thorax of the T. pruinosus.

Posted By: Jake Readnour | On: 2011-07-24 | Website:

correct me if i am wrong but i do not think canicularis is even close to kansas or MO? tibicen auriferus sounds the same and looks alot like them and it is very commen in kansas. As far as i know east Iowa has the last westmost populations of canicularis and those are thiner the farther south you get.however western montana might have populations of them but

Posted By: Jimmy Wu | On: 2011-07-24 | Website: http://www.youtube.com/user/Mantisman630

Actually we have localized populations of them it seems, occasionally I hear what seem to be T. canicularis and have sometimes caught T. "pruinosus" that seem a little bit shiny and dark to be a T. pruinosus, I regret not keeping many of the collected specimens over the years so I don't have any photographic proof in order for me to show and be certain that the species I've collected really are Tibicen canicularis...but I've definitely heard what seems to be the songs of T. canicularis. But they may just be T. aurifera.

Posted By: Jake Readnour | On: 2011-07-24 | Website:

i got this one as a teneral gerry.

Posted By: Massachusetts Cicadas | On: 2011-07-24 | Website:

The calls of T. canicularis, T. davis and T. auriferus are quite similar. Honestly I get confused with which is which out there in the mid-west. Suffice it to say that I hear that some species are replaced with others. T. canicularis is more northern in its distribution even in the mid-west, T. auriferus is a more grassy cicada and T. davisi is more southern in its distribution. They do vary morphologically to some extent.

Posted By: Jake Readnour | On: 2011-07-25 | Website:

i have only had one live female canicularis in hand. its possible their are isolated populations of canicularis 100 miles out of their range around kansas. but i have benn all over illinois and they seem to be very restricted to the northeast. but that by no means says their can not be isolated populations that in time may evolve into their own taxa. the montana varaints and iowa varaints look very odd ? i have seen some strange things in the green group as a whole the last two years. i guess i will leave off with that. off to take a look at litchfeild again

Posted By: Bill Meyers | On: 2011-07-27 | Website:

Uhm... I'm certainly not an expert, but I don't think that's a T. pruinosus. The gold dusting, dark cruciform elevation, dark pronotal collar, and "feathery" markings on the side of the mesonotum (lateral sigilla) just don't scream out T. pruinosus to me.

I can't tell from the photo, but are there pruinose spots on the sides of the last tergite and sternite (#8 or #9, I think) nearest the genitalia? All of the T. pruinosus I have encountered here in Missouri have them. The T. robinsonius around here have them, also, but not as powdery white on the sternite as the T. pruinosa.

Anyway, like I said, I'm no expert, but it's not screaming T. pruinosa to me.

I think Gerry is right. It's probably a variety of T. canicularis.

Bugguide.net has a photo of a T. canicularis that is a very close match:

http://bugguide.net/node/view/443266/bgimage

Cheers