One afternoon when I headed out my truck after work, I found a large grasshopper on the windshield. It had some truly stunning colors, and it looked great against the background of the blue sky. Amazingly, it wasn’t storming on that particular afternoon, and I just couldn’t resist taking some pictures. I just loved the unusual angles and background. Let’s face it, I do enjoy the odd and different! This particular grasshopper is an American bird grasshopper or American grasshopper (Schistocerca americana), which is found in the eastern United States, the Bahamas, and Mexico. It’s very common in Florida, and usually eats grasses, but it can also eat dogwoods, palm trees, and hickory trees. Unfortunately, here in Florida it can also be a crop pest and is well known for damaging citrus trees. Some years, there may be population explosions (luckily not too often) and these grasshoppers can also cause considerable damage to corn, peanuts, ornamentals, and vegetables, too. I personally think these grasshoppers are gorgeous, and my philosophy is live and let live (but I don’t make my living farming), so I don’t mind them being around. Fortunately, most of the time they don’t cause a lot of problems. This particular grasshopper crawled around on the windshield for about a minute, and then it flew off to explore somewhere else.