Science Activities With Crickets

Snowy Tree Crickets (Oecanthus Fultoni)

• These crickets are known as chirping thermometers. They chirp in synchronization, and their chirps are actually slow enough to count. The rate of their chirps increases as the temperature rises. You can record the sounds of the crickets and compare them to the temperature. You can learn to tell the temperature just by listening to the crickets. Other variables can affect the speed of their chirps, so it is not always 100 percent accurate. Snowy tree crickets are found in every state except Hawaii, Alaska, Florida and Montana.

Measuring Growing Crickets

• Crickets molt as they grow, shedding their exoskeletons and growing new ones. Baby crickets are about the size of ants. You can learn about the growth stages of crickets by measuring them periodically during their growth cycles and logging the data in a chart. This is a good way to learn about crickets, but it also teaches necessary measurement skills and how to log scientific data. Measure them once a week from when they hatch to adulthood. Note the changes you observe with the measurement data.

How Crickets are Attracted to Light

• You can use boxes of different colors, both light and dark, to determine if crickets are attracted to the light or to the dark. You need four small boxes. Line the inside of each box with a sheet of construction paper. One box should be lined with red, one with purple, one with green and one with white construction paper. Place the colored boxes in the area where the crickets are. Count how many crickets are attracted to each box. Time how long it takes each box to attract crickets. Log your results. When you know what colors attract crickets you can catch them more easily.

Breeding Crickets

• You can study the conditions that are best for breeding crickets. For example, you can keep one colony of crickets in hot, humid conditions and another in cool, dry conditions and monitor them to see which environment the crickets breed best in. Use four colonies of crickets. Use spray bottles and heat lamps to create a hot dry environment, a cool dry environment, a hot moist environment and a cool moist environment. Make sure they have plenty of food and water to survive. Monitor the colonies for a few weeks to determine which environment the crickets reproduce best in.