Common name - Broad-banded grasshopper (Heifer, 1972).
Recent synonymy - Trimerotropis laticinta (Saussure).
Geographic distribution - Great Basin, Alberta (Canada) to Washington and California, Arizona, Texas and Iowa (Heifer, 1972). It is found throughout the state in Colorado.
Habitat - sandy, alkaline flats where the main vegetation is greasewood and sagebrush (Brooks, 1958).
Food habits - graminivorous, preferring western wheatgrass (Brooks, 1968).
Nymph - five instars (Scoggan and Brusven, 1972).
Adult - large size; robust. General color is grey or brown to blackish. Antennae are slender and dark. Face is vertical; vertex is rounded. Sculpturing on head is sharply defined. Dorsal posterior margin of pronotum is a rounded right angle. Median carina is very faint on the posterior two-thirds of the pronotum. Pronotum is delicately textured. Tegmina have prominent crossbands. Wing disc is yellow to whitish, band is black and wider than disc; spur is short; veins bordering crossband are mostly white; tip is clear. Hind tibiae are orange, often yellow near the attachment to the femora. Ventral surfaces of thorax and abdomen are often tinged with red (Beamer, 1917; Heifer, 1972; Hewitt and Barr, 1967; Scoggan and Brusven, 1972).
Seasonal history - overwinters as an egg. It hatches from May to early June. Adults are present from July to August (Scoggan and Brusven, 1972).
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Biology of Common Colorado Grasshoppers List
Biology of Common Colorado Grasshoppers
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