It is the elusive creature with a high-pitched song that lives in one part of Hampshire.
But now the New Forest cicada has been named as one of the most endangered animals in the entire country.
The insect – the only one of its type in the country – has not been seen since 2000, and there are fears that it may already be extinct.
But a dedicated team of environmentalists set up to hunt for the cicada sa y they believe they still live in some areas of the New Forest.
The Species Recovery Trust, an online project looking at the UK’s most endangered animals, has revealed that more than 400 species – including the great auk, orange-spotted emerald dragonfly and the wildcat – have become extinct in the country in the past 200 years.
And the trust says the New Forest cicada is one of the ten animals most likely to follow them in disappearing from the UK altogether.
The last unconfirmed sighting of a cicada was in 2000, with the trust saying change in habitat and weather pattern has led to a decline in numbers.
The New Forest Project was set up to track the insects down, and its members even set up a special phone app so members of the public can help track them down.
And they say they will head back to the the remotest areas of the Forest this summer in a bid to find them.
If they are successful, a captive breeding programme may be set up to boost the insect’s numbers.
One of the team, University of Southampton lecturer Alex Rogers, said: “It has not been observed for the past 20 years,but it hasn’t been seen for long stretches in the past too, such as the 1940′s or 1960′s.”
“It’s not at the previous sites it’s been seen at, but it may have just moved somewhere else and the New Forest is such a large area that it’s hard to detect them.”
“It could be there – it’s just a case of finding it.”
Davide Zilli, a PhD student at the university, said: “We have been working hard to improve the app.”
“We had about 2,000 people downloading it last year and we think that if it’s sunny it could be a good summer to find them this year.”