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Alien origin and spread of this SINA species.
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Remarks:
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This tiny scaly cricket (<6 mm) is known from the continental United States from eight specimens collected in 1949 and 1950 by H.F. Strohecker (1952, p. 683) in his house in Miami. Because all houses in his neighborhood were built in 1948 he concluded that it was probable that the species was already present in the pine woods that were removed prior to building.
The type locality of C. americanus is Cuba and its New World distribution includes Vera Cruz, Baja California, Venezuela, and Hawaii. Love & Walker (1979, p. 10) note that "Such a distribution suggests a well traveled adventive. Perhaps americanus came to the New World in the same slave ships that brought the "American" cockroach." They cite Rehn 1945 as stimulating this speculation.
It is also worth noting that in the Cape region of Baja California, Mexico, D. B. Weissman collected two morphologically similar Cycloptiloides that sang short trills of single pulses, one at ca. 18 p/s and the other at ca. 115 p/s. Whether either is conspecific with Florida Cycloptiloides is unknown (see page 10, Love and Walker 1979).
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References:
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Mesa et al. 2002.
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Nomenclature:
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OSF (Orthoptera Species File Online).
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