They could be, indeed.CelticRambler wrote: ↑Tue Aug 02, 2022 10:40 pm Or could these be the empty shells of an adult that's already metamorphosed and gone off to scratch his legs in the grass?
Each "creature" was still attached this morning to the same rush as yesterday evening, so I was pretty sure they were empty exoskeletons. Getting up close, and with the sunlight coming from behind, one could see that there was no body inside, and with a bit of contortion, I could just about see the back of a couple where there's a great hole through which the adult would have emerged.
My frogs might well have feasted on the adults as they appeared; but the spiders are recycling the empty shells!
This is the first time I've seen real-life evidence of this stage of metamorphosis, and I think I can confirm that I currently have a healthy population of grasshoppers, sorry: great green bush cricket! This might also be why I don't have Colorado beetles on my potatoes.