“Here in the South, our grasslands are where most of our, a huge part of our biodiversity are. And most people don't even know that we have natural grasslands in the Southeast…but they were some of the first things to be developed because they were already open. You didn't have to clear them…And so they were lost early on. And all we have now are these small little fragments. Within the last, I'll say seven years now, I've described close to 40 new species of grasshoppers, if we include these seven, from the southeast alone. And 34 of them, probably 35, are grassland inhabitants. So we almost, you know, we're in danger of losing all these species before we even knew they existed. Right here in our backyard in Eastern North America. You think, you know, oh, it's North America. We know, you know, most everything here. Well, we don't.” In this episode, Dr. JoVonn Hill pulls us headfirst into the world of grasshopper research as he tells us about collecting in central Texas. He shares his thoughts on what accessibility in publications can look like, the unique role of scientific illustration, and advises us on the importance of an afternoon Dairy Queen break. JoVonn’s paper “Diversification deep in the heart of Texas: seven new grasshopper species and establishment of the Melanoplus discolor species group (Orthoptera, Acrididae, Melanoplinae)” is in issue 1165 of Zookeys.  It can be found here: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1165.104047 New Species: Melanoplus nelsoni - Nelson’s pouncer Melanoplus walkeri - Walker’s pouncer Melanoplus susdentatus - Hog-toothed pouncer Melanoplus balcones - Balcones pouncer Melanoplus corniculatus - Antlered pouncer Melanoplus comanche - Comanche pouncer Melanoplus tonkawa - Tonkawa pouncer Episode image courtesy of JoVonn Hill Follow JoVonn on Twitter: @JoVonnH Mississippi State Moth Photographers Group: https://mothphotographersgroup.msstate.edu/ Grasshoppers of North America: Volume 1 and Volume 2 A transcript of this episode can be found here: JoVonn Hill - Transcript Check out our website: www.newspeciespodcast.net Be sure to follow New Species on Twitter (@PodcastSpecies) and like the podcast page on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NewSpeciesPodcast) Music in this podcast is "No More (Instrumental)," by HaTom (https://fanlink.to/HaTom) If you have questions or feedback about this podcast, please e-mail us at [email protected] If you would like to support this podcast, please consider doing so at https://www.patreon.com/NewSpeciesPod