Australia is well-known as the land of venomous and/or deadly creepy crawlies. However, there are plenty of reptiles and insects in the land down under that aren’t deadly, but are still plenty creepy.
One of the more interesting creatures in this category is the non-life-threatening, but still all-around freaky, mole cricket.
Kinda cute, right?
These little buggers might look like your typical cricket at first glance, but look closer and you’ll see they’re way more than your average pest. From the same family as grasshoppers and locusts, the mole cricket has highly developed shovel-like forearms designed for digging.
Even though they’re not deadly to humans, mole crickets can be still be quite annoying.
Their constant digging can cause massive damage to young crops, which is why farmers hate them so much. However, that’s not the only bad thing about them. The worst are the males during mating season…
While mole crickets spend the majority of their lives living underground, that changes during mating season.
For these few months, adult mole crickets spread their wings and go off in search of mates. It’s during this season that male mole crickets deploy their mating song. In the insect kingdom, they have an exceptionally loud song.
Unfortunately, mole crickets aren’t just limited to Australia.
Scientists have found them all around the world, stretching from Down Under all the way to North America, Europe, and Africa.
Reading about them is one thing, but seeing a mole cricket in action is something else entirely.
Just when I thought Australia couldn’t get any freakier!
What’s even worse is that these things are probably living under my front lawn right now…