On the wildgrass-covered slope next to school, you can see a lot of these little foamy things, that look like spit, on the stalks of the tall grasses and herbs.
One of my students collected some to look at under the microscope. We thought it might be the collection of eggs of some creature. It turned out that, at the center of the foam, was what looked like an immature insect. A quick google search for “spit bugs” turned up froghoppers, whose nymphs create the spit to protect them from the environment (heat, cold) and hide themselves from predators.
They suck the sap of the plants they’re on, and can be agricultural pests.
