Cicada

Description:

Yellow-brownish spent exoskeletons, or exuvias, cast off when nymph emerged as an adult. About 3-3;5cm in length, and seen in large numbers on that spot - these exuvias were covering almost every tree in that picnic spot of some 150m². It is very hard to say the species, but I would suspect the European cicada (Lyristes plebejus), the most common one in Mediterranean.

Habitat:

Seen in large numbers in a picnic area of a service station along the Italian highway, somewhere in rural area around Parma.