snails and cicadas

Drawing of insects from an Australian garden, given to me by friends and family - a snail and cicada
Watercolour pencil in Moleskine Sketchbook

I had always called both of these cicadas and so when I was drawing these I had to actually find out what they were. I was right . They ARE both cicadas. The shell is what the nymph discards when it emerges from living underground.. I remember them being on paperbark trees. At high school we used to put them on our jumpers  like a  brooch.

This particular cicada is a Bladder Cicada. Not the nicest of names, but definitely the prettiest cicada. It ia the less ïnsect-looking" cicada I think

Cicadas are well known for their song/drone. It happens in summer around dusk. The noise is so loud that we always had to close the windows on those hot Queensland summer nights toblock the noise.
The male Bladder Cicadas have the greatly enlarged abdomen, largely hollow. This is the resonating chamber to amplify the loudness of their songs. Females are smaller in size and relatively smaller abdomen.


and here is the snail......