Sound production in crickets and bush-crickets
Crickets and bush-crickets (Orthoptera, Ensifera) produce their – often very loud – songs by rubbing their wings together: A hardened part at the inner edge of one wing, aptly called a “plectrum”, is swept along a modified vein on the underside of the other wing, called the “stridulatory file”. This file contains a row of small teeth and each time the plectrum hits a tooth, an oscillation is produced. By rapidly opening and closing the wings, many teeth are struck in quick succession (similar to playing a washboard), producing constant oscillations spreading through the wing. These vibrations are then picked up by specialised structures within the wings and radiated into the surrounding environment as acoustic sound waves, i.e. the animal’s song.
Teleogryllus stridulationHigh-speed video recording (1000 fps) of a male cricket (Teleogryllus oceanicus). The cricket wings are filmed from behind, so the underside of the wings is visible. The top trace shows the sound being created by each closing movement of the wings, as the plectrum of the left wing scrapes over the teeth on the stridulatory file of the right wing.