The Cult

It was exquisite. Tiny, but so beautiful. I could scarcely credit it, even though long experience looking at things in the natural world had taught me that the size of something placed little constraint on how perfect its colors and form could be.

I had been looking through a field of wildflowers for butterflies, spiders, bee flies, wasps and whatever chanced in front of me. It was a gorgeous afternoon, if a bit windy for photographic ease. Still, my camera was along, and I had hopes of getting a good shot or two.

A few toyons edged the field, and I worked my way toward them without finding much of interest along the way. Fruit had been set. Toyon would live up to its common name of Christmas Berry again this year. But the berries on the small tree before me had been found by a host of black and red bugs, too. There were several nymphal instars, each with its own distinctive patchwork of red squares on a black background. As I scanned the tree for adults, what looked like a splinter on one of the toyon’s prickle-edged leaves caught my eye.

Perhaps it’s alive, I thought, taking a photo before getting close enough to see it clearly. It avoided me, so there wasn’t any question about whether it was alive or not. At a quarter inch long max, however, and maybe a millimeter wide, I had not gotten enough of a look to be sure what it was. My eyes are not what they once were. 

The photo, though, nearly knocked me over. Here was a leafhopper, one of the true bugs, but unlike any I knew existed. A colorful pastel array was woven into an intricate abstract scene covering its roof-like wings. Its head and eyes blended with the pattern to render them almost invisible.

The words icon and iconic are two of the most misused words in present day English. But here was a creature that I could put in that category. Not in the misused sense, but rather I imagined this creature reproduced as an enormous icon erected above the altar of some strange cult. I do not know what the cult professes to believe, but whatever it is, I am a convert. And I have been looking for leafhoppers ever since!