“The sounds of the night are part of my research,” said Sharon Martinson, a scientist who shifts between the Panama facility and her home in Wyoming. “I spend all of my time listening and thinking about the music of the insects.”

The Tropical Research Institute attracts hundreds of researchers who are interested in learning about the plants and animals that inhabit tropical rainforests. The nearly 100-year-old island reserve, which is in a man-made lake in the Panama Canal, has labs and bedrooms for the visiting scientists. It also has a thick canopy of trees for the critters, including spider monkeys, anteaters, three-toed sloths, toucans, glass-winged butterflies and more than 100 species of katydids, which are related to grasshoppers and crickets.

“More research has been done here than nearly any other place because the Smithsonian, in relationship with the Panamanian government, set aside this land to study and understand tropical rainforests,” Martinson said.

Martinson typically spends about three months a year at the institute, although the coronavirus pandemic caused her to miss her sixth season. However, she could still listen to the katydids from thousands of miles away, thanks to recording equipment hung in the trees. In Panama, Martinson or another member of the katydid team hike into the forest twice each nighttime — at 11 p.m. and 4 a.m. — to collect katydids. Even when they are inches from the insects, they may not hear them.

“A lot of what goes on at night is silent to us, because it is above our hearing range,” she said.

Katydids create a clicking sound by rubbing their wings together, which Martinson compares to running a fork over a comb. The males, on the hunt for a female mate, are the noisiest. Unfortunately, bats can disturb the love connection.

“We think of tropical rainforests as beautiful, but if you’re a katydid, it’s a terribly frightening place, because you are so delicious,” said Martinson. “Everything wants to eat you.”

To avoid detection, the insects can also communicate by vibrating. A katydid on a nearby plant can feel the message and track down the sender. The insects, which are typically green or brown, also blend into the forest so well, you might mistake one for a leaf or a branch.

“They hide all day long by not moving and being like, “I’m a leaf, I’m a leaf, I’m a leaf,” she said.

Their camouflage doesn’t always fool the scientists, who can sometimes find 100 katydids in one outing. Back at the lab, they weigh, measure and tag the bugs with a tiny button they attach to the pronotum, or neck, with a dab of wax. To study their songs, Martinson puts a katydid in a recording studio, which is a mesh box with a miniature microphone. The team’s research has led to several discoveries, such as the surprisingly short length of their songs.

“Katydids might call a thousand times a night,” Martinson said, “but the total sound is only two seconds long.”

In addition to being a scientist, Martinson is a musician in the folk band, the Littlest Birds. Some nights, she will perform alongside the katydids in the rainforest. But instead of rubbing her wings, she plucks a banjo.

This story is part of a series about lesser-known aspects of the Smithsonian Institution, which celebrates its 175th anniversary
this year.

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