If you hear a forest at night in the tropics, you are probably listening to the family Tettigoniidae: the katydids, or bush crickets. With more than 7,000 described species, it is one of the largest and noisiest insect families on Earth.
Katydids are easy to recognize once you know the signs: antennae longer than the body, four-segmented tarsi, hearing organs on the front tibiae, and a long, blade-like ovipositor in females. Males sing by rubbing their forewings together, a sound that defines tropical nights.
On Rinjani, katydids were everywhere, from the small green singers in the undergrowth to the enormous leaf-mimicking giants higher up the mountain.
