These 7 weta facts highlight these truly iconic New Zealand species. They may not be as well known as kiwi, but they are unique to the country.
New Zealand is such an amazing place to live. The landscape is truly breathtaking with heaps of beautiful beaches, big rivers, mountains galore, and bush. Some of the country’s native animals, such as the kiwi, are renowned worldwide. There are many other unique species that I never knew about prior to living in New Zealand, such as the kea, kaka, native frogs, and weta. Here are 7 weta facts to help you appreciate these small animals.
7 Weta Facts
There are 5 main types of weta that can be found in New Zealand – tree weta, cave weta, giant weta, tusked weta, and ground weta.
New Zealand is home to more than 70 species of weta, all of which can be found nowhere else in the world. Not only are they all endemic to the country, but they are also all flightless. Flightlessness is one of the characteristics common to island species. Species that live isolated on islands for a very long time sometimes evolve in unique ways, such as becoming flightless or growing large.
All of the weta in New Zealand are endemic, but similar insects can be found in other countries across the Southern Hemisphere, including in South Africa, Australia, and South America.
Weta look somewhat like big grasshoppers with long antennae and spiny legs. Similar to some animals, including humans, weta are sexually dimorphic. This means that males and females have different physical appearances. Some of the males have bigger jaws. In contrast, females have an ovipositor at the end of their bodies that look like big stingers. The ovipositor is not a stinger, rather it is for egg laying. Females insert the ovipositor into moss, soil, or wood to deposit eggs in order to give the eggs a better chance at surviving.
In New Zealand’s native forests and shrublands weta took the role that rodents do in other parts of the world. Remember, for nearly 85 million years, there were no land mammals in the country. Thus, weta come out at night to eat forest floor vegetation, and sometimes will even eat other insects.
Weta populations have been declining across the country ever since the arrival of people about 800 years ago. At least 16 species are now at risk of becoming extinct. The main threat to these insects comes from habitat destruction and being preyed upon by lizards and many introduced species, including cats, rats, mice, stoats, and hedgehogs. Some species now live in a greatly reduced areas. Others, such as the cook strait giant weta have been wiped out on the mainland and now only live on predator-free islands. However, some have recently been transplanted to mainland predator free sanctuaries.
Weta are iconic New Zealand. One of the ways that they became known to me was in a roundabout way via the Lord of the Rings movie series. Those movies put the amazing landscapes of the country into a lot of people’s minds, including mine. The special effect studio that did a lot of the work for the movies is based in Wellington and is called, Weta Workshop after these unique insects.