A mostly sedentary insect that sits on tree twigs and sucks the juices like little vampires, while pretending to be thorns. Body roughly tiangular with the apex prolonged into a forward-pointed horn. Black, with two cream to pale yellow marks on top. Eyes prominent, red to red-brown. Legs fat and stubby. They excrete excess sugary sap, attracting ants, as seen below.

Common predator on a variety of trees and woody plants, including redbud, hoptree, black locust, black walnut, nannyberry, and American bittersweet. Not actually known in Wildwood, but seen on hoptree across Grove Avenue from the Park. Since they fly readily, it is unlikely they have not invaded the Park.

Easily identified by the thorny shape, the two marks on the back, and the red eye.

Recently, researchers have proposed that the hoppers specialize in which species of tree they attack, and that hoppers on different trees are actually different species which rarely visit each other, and thus don't interbreed. If true, that necessitates new Latin names, but so far no one has written a paper to formally name them. Bugguide, an excellent insect identfication website, proposes the stopgap name "Enchenopa on-ptelea" for our hoptree sucking version. A new common name is also needed, and I propose the obvious "Hoptree Treehopper."