Bow-winged Grasshopper

Chorthippus biguttulus · Order: Orthoptera · Family: Acrididae

No source yet on danger. We have no source yet on whether it bites, stings or damages anything.
Bow-winged Grasshopper
Photo: Gilles San Martin, CC BY-SA

Females are about 2 cm long and males about 1.5 cm. Its range stretches from Finland and Scandinavia down to the Alps and Pyrenees and extends eastward into Asia, including Japan.

Source: Wikipedia

How to recognize it

Males often have a red tip on the abdomen, which females do not have. Both sexes can be green, black-brown, or rose in colour.

Source: Wikipedia

Lookalikes

It can be confused with C. brunneus and C. mollis, which are distinguished by wing field sizes and song patterns.

Source: Wikipedia

Where it is found in the US

Recorded in 1 of 51 states and DC. Most records: Pennsylvania.

Darker = more records. Counts are museum and citizen-science records, not population size.

Source: GBIF

More photos

Bow-winged Grasshopper photo 3
Photo: Gilles San Martin, CC BY-SA
Bow-winged Grasshopper photo 4
Photo: Benoit NABHOLZ, CC BY-SA

Same family (Acrididae)

Differential GrasshopperDifferential GrasshopperMelanoplus differentialisDamages trees, gardens or cropsTwo-striped GrasshopperTwo-striped GrasshopperMelanoplus bivittatusDamages trees, gardens or cropsCarolina GrasshopperCarolina GrasshopperDissosteira carolinaDamages trees, gardens or cropsCommon Field GrasshopperCommon Field GrasshopperChorthippus brunneusEgyptian Bird GrasshopperEgyptian Bird GrasshopperAnacridium aegyptiumGray Bird GrasshopperGray Bird GrasshopperSchistocerca nitensDamages trees, gardens or crops

Sources

  • Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chorthippus_biguttulus

Look it up elsewhere: GBIF · iNaturalist · BugGuide · Wikipedia

Text written 2026-10-22 from the sources above and checked sentence by sentence against them. Data fetched 2026-10-22.

How this page works

This is one bug's fact sheet. The colored box at the top says whether it is dangerous. Sections below cover how to recognize it, whether it is a pest, and how to deal with it. The US map shows which states have records; tap a state to see other bugs there.

Every fact on Bug FAQ comes from a named source (university extension sites, government agencies, GBIF, iNaturalist, Wikipedia). The source is linked next to each section. If we have no source for something, we leave it out.