Sad frog face

This is the pick of the leafhoppers I found in the garden today. It's about 5-6mm long, and glories in the name Lamprotettix nitidulus. Despite extensive searches I haven't been able to find out anything else about it, beyond the statement that it's "[l]ocally common across much of England, Wales and Ireland, usually on trees." It may well be common, but I hadn't seen one before I beat this one out of our Lawson cyprus. British Bugs says that the pattern on the scutellum is a good identification feature, but then witters on about the dark triangles, without mentioning what to me is the blindingly obvious fact that it looks like a sad faced frog emoji.

Two days out in a row, followed by a bad night last night, left me feeling exhausted and post-viral again today, so I didn't do much apart from picking stupid quarrels with R and pestering a few invertebrates. I found some other nice specimens as well as this one, and I've pulled my favourites together into a Facebook post, if you'd care to take a look.

Speaking of Facebook, if you're not a member of that hellsite you may have missed the culmination of the Blipfoto #PRSpiders campaign, which resulted in some nice publicity on Buglife. As ever, this was down to the hard work of WharfedaleBex and Richard - so thanks and congratulations to them.