Never Promised Her a Rose Garden

Up close, the katydid looks as ferocious as a scary Halloween trick-or-treater.

Its stance is firm. Its eyes glow menacingly. Its attitude: "Don't mess with me."

We spotted this katydid on a rose in a UC Davis rose garden. It towered over the honey bees, spotted cucumber beetles, ladybugs, hover flies, and assorted other insects.

The katydid, in the family Tettigonlidae, is also known as a long-horned grasshopper, but entomologists point out it's more closely related to crickets than grasshoppers.

Tettigoniids dine on flowers, leaves, bark and seed, and some feed on other insects.

Now if the katydid were six feet tall...that would scare any trick-or-treater...