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Sticker of Double drummer
Bug card No. 0419 of 1,500

Double drummer

Thopha saccata
Name means: “Thopha comes from a Hebrew word for drum, and saccata from the Latin word for a bag”
Eats: PlantsTrue bugs and cicadasForests and woods6 legs

The double drummer is the biggest cicada in Australia and maybe the loudest insect in the world. The boys have two big red-brown pockets on their sides, like two little drums. They use them to make their song super loud.

Lives in
Eastern Australia, high up in big gum trees
Length
4.7 to 5.1 cm (1.9 to 2 in)
Wingspan
13 to 15 cm (5.2 to 5.9 in)
Top speed
about 14 km/h (8.7 mph)
Flying, estimate
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
It does not bite or sting. It is only very, very loud.
What does it eat?
Like other cicadas, it drinks sap from trees with its long, straw-like mouth. The young ones live underground and drink sap from roots.
For real!Photo of Double drummer
Picture by Toby Hudson. CC BY-SA 3.0 au, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

Double drummer about 5.1 cm long (2 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)A banana about 18 cm (7.1 in)

How wide are its wings?

Double drummer wings about 15 cm tip to tip (5.9 in)A crayon about 9 cm (3.5 in)A banana about 18 cm (7.1 in)A house cat about 50 cm (20 in)
as long as 8 grains of rice in a rowas long as 1.5 toy building bricks in a rowwings as wide as your handcould fly across a whole football pitch in 27 secondsmoves 76 times its own body length every second

How big is Double drummer compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

A big group of double drummers can be louder than a rock concert. Their song sounds a bit like high bagpipes.

2

The babies, called nymphs, live underground for several years before they climb up and become grown-ups.

3

As a grown-up it lives only about four to five weeks.

4

Some summers there are huge numbers of them, and in other years there are almost none.

5

The first scientist to describe it thought it came from China by mistake. It really lives in Australia.

you asked

Most asked questions about Double drummer

?What is the loudest insect in the world?

The double drummer cicada from Australia is said to be the loudest. A big group can be louder than 120 decibels.

?Do cicadas bite?

No. The double drummer cannot hurt you. It just sings very loudly.

?How big is a double drummer?

Its body is about 5 centimetres long and its wings are about 13 to 15 centimetres from tip to tip.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Thopha saccata
Named by
Fabricius, 1803
Group
True bugs and cicadas
Family
Cicadidae
Classification
Insecta > Hemiptera > Cicadidae
Lives on
Australia and Oceania

Where the facts come from

  1. Thopha saccata (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 Toby Hudson. CC BY-SA 3.0 au, 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 [email protected] and we will fix it.

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