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Field cricket

Gryllus campestris

The field cricket is a big, dark, shiny cricket that cannot fly. The males dig a little hole in the ground and sit at the door singing. Their chirping song calls the females to come and visit.

Lives in
Europe, on dry, sunny grassland with short grass
Length
1.7 to 2.3 cm (0.67 to 0.91 in)
Top speed
about 3.2 km/h (2 mph)
On foot, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It is shy and hops back into its hole when you come close.
What does it eat?
It mostly nibbles grass and other plants, and sometimes eats small insects.
For real!Photo of Field cricket
Picture by Roberto Zanon. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

Field cricket about 2.3 cm long (0.91 in)A grain of rice about 6 mm (0.24 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)
as long as 4 grains of rice in a rowcould run across a dinner table in 1.1 secondsmoves 39 times its own body length every second

How big is Field cricket compared to YOU?

Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.

How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

It only sings when it is warm, more than 13 degrees.

2

Each male has his own burrow and guards it fiercely against other males.

3

The babies spend the winter as half-grown nymphs and become adults in spring.

4

In Britain it became so rare that only about 100 crickets were left in one place. People helped by moving crickets to new homes.

5

In 2022, 70 crickets from Spain were let go in a field in Cornwall. A year later there were about 1000.

you asked

Most asked questions about Field cricket

?Can field crickets fly?

No. Field crickets cannot fly, so they cannot travel far to find new homes.

?Why do field crickets chirp?

The males sing at the door of their burrow to call females.

?How big is a field cricket?

About 17 to 23 millimetres long, around 2 centimetres.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Gryllus campestris
Named by
Linnaeus, 1758
Group
Grasshoppers and crickets
Family
Gryllidae
Classification
Insecta > Orthoptera > Gryllidae
Lives on
Europe
Also known as
European field cricket

Where the facts come from

  1. Gryllus campestris (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by Roberto Zanon. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.

If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at hello@bugwiki.app and we will fix it.

More from the same group: Grasshoppers and crickets

Also at home here: Gardens and meadows