Claire Cricket loves hopping around. Although she has small wings, she can’t fly, but she sees and hears very well, especially at night. She’s usually on the lookout in Vegetable Row, watching what Mr. Peter Pot is doing in the garden, so that she can quickly chirp and tell her friends to stop munching the cabbages and run and hide. But most of the time she likes chatting with her cousin Gerry Grasshopper and hopping between the plants and flowers.

The cricket

The cricket lives in fields and gardens, beneath rocks and debris. It can be black, red, brown or green in colour. It likes to eat plants and insects. It has compound eyes that can see in many different directions at the same time, and it has long feelers which help it to find food. The cricket is cold-blooded so it comes out when the weather is warm and only at dusk and night time, because it is nocturnal.

Crickets are well-known because of their song. They can’t fly because their wings are too small, but the male crickets rub their wings together to make a chirping sound, to attract female crickets. In hot weather they chirp more quickly. In cold weather, they lose energy, so their chirping slows down. The female cricket lays about 200 eggs! The baby crickets look like mini adult crickets.

People eat crickets in some countries like Vietnam. In Japan and China, they are considered to be good luck.

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