''Eurymela fenestrata'', widely known as the common jassid and sometimes as the large gum treehopper, is a species of leafhopper found throughout mainland Australia.

Description

The common jassid is a large leafhopper, adults reaching a length of . The body shape has been compared to a bison, and is robust and wedge-shaped, broad at the front and bluntly tapering at the back. The wide

prothorax The prothorax is the foremost of the three segments in the thorax of an insect, and bears the first pair of legs. Its principal sclerites (exoskeletal plates) are the pronotum ( dorsal), the prosternum ( ventral), and the propleuron ( lateral) o ...

is red and the abdomen brown and deep violet, with several white patches on the wings. The limbs are black. The

nymph A nymph ( grc, νύμφη, nýmphē, el, script=Latn, nímfi, label= Modern Greek; , ) in ancient Greek folklore is a minor female nature deity. Different from Greek goddesses, nymphs are generally regarded as personifications of nature, are ...

s are reddish-brown marked with black.

Ecology

Leafhoppers are

hemimetabolous Hemimetabolism or hemimetaboly, also called incomplete metamorphosis and paurometabolism,McGavin, George C. ''Essential Entomology: An Order-by-Order Introduction''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. pp. 20. is the mode of development of certa ...

insects with incomplete metamorphosis. They have an egg stage, five nymphal stages and an adult stage. In this species there is normally a single generation each year. Like other leafhoppers, the common jassid sucks sap from plants, in this case, various species of ''

Eucalyptus ''Eucalyptus'' () is a genus of over seven hundred species of flowering trees, shrubs or mallees in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalypteae, including '' Corymbia'', they are commonly known as e ...

''. The sap is a watery fluid and large quantities need to be ingested for the insects to obtain all the nutrients they need. The excess liquid is excreted as honeydew and

sooty mould Sooty mold (also spelled sooty mould) is a collective term for different Ascomycete fungi, which includes many genera, commonly ''Cladosporium'' and ''Alternaria''. It grows on plants and their fruit, but also environmental objects, like fences, ...

often grows on this.

References

External links

Eurymela fenestrata
at

Atlas of Living Australia The Atlas of Living Australia (ALA) is an online repository of information about Australian plants, animals, and fungi. Development started in 2006. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) is an organisation sig ...

{{Taxonbar, from=Q5414036 Insects described in 1825 Hemiptera of Australia Taxa named by Amédée Louis Michel le Peletier Taxa named by Jean Guillaume Audinet-Serville