Friday 16 January 2009

Fulgoroid Friday

This planthopper was photographed during a frogging session at Sinharaja 'World Heritage' rain forest during my Christmas birding tour. It was barely 3 cm in length. For you inquiring minds, its classification is as follows.

Kingdom: Animalia, Phylum: Arthropoda, Class: Insecta, Order: Hemiptera, Suborder: Auchenorrhyncha, Infraorder: Fulgoromorpha, Superfamily: Fulgoroidea, Family: Dictyopharidae.

The Biologist Dr. Priyantha Wijesinghe whom I consulted for this had crosschecked its identification with an expert on a related family, and fowarded me his reply. It said, "...I reach the same conclusion as you: probably close to Centromeria viridistigma (or maybe it is that species) but as I am not a Dictyo specialist, I really cannot tell you more..."

?Centromeria viridistigma

15 comments:

Rhythmic Diaspora said...

Wow Amila,

The colours on that are just so bright and vivid. Amazing.

Amila Salgado said...

Thanks RD,
It was a pretty gaudy critter. I didn't use photoshop for any colour editing.

Times Eye said...

wow beautiful picture...i dream to go back to sinharaja...how did you book that?

Amila Salgado said...

Hi Poojitha,
I booked it myself! I am a tour organiser/tour leader.

Anonymous said...

Faaar out Amila - positively psychedelic!

Amila Salgado said...

Thank you, Mr. Jones!

Anonymous said...

Amazing as usual, Amila!

Amila Salgado said...

Hi Sean,
Thanks a lot! Great to hear from you.

Sunita Mohan said...

Are you sure you didnt Photoshop that just to fool us? :D
I cant imagine such a psychedlic-looking creature. It looks as if it was painted when Mother Nature was tripping!

spookydragonfly said...

Simply awesome coloring this tiny creature exhibits...you've captured it's true colors perfectly, Amila! I wish we had such colorful creatures in my area.

Amila Salgado said...

Hi Sunitha,
No photoshopping was done except painting the eye colour and the area surrounding it....just kidding!

I only cropped it and included my credits. Glad you liked it.

Hi Kim,
Some of these tiny rain forest critters make excellen macro subjects. I am happy you liked it.

Unknown said...

WOW Amila! Amazing as always.

Amila Salgado said...

Hi Chandanie,
Thanks a lot! I am pleased to hear those comments.

This Is My Blog - fishing guy said...

Amilia: I do love the flouresent colors on that tiny hopper.

Amila Salgado said...

Hi Fishing Guy,
Yes those colours were quite amazing to see when I first found it. I am glad they were captured well in the pic.

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