UH Hilo Center for Maunakea Stewardship - Research Library

Of killer caterpillars and vampire bugs

Author:
Berger, Cynthia
Title:
Of killer caterpillars and vampire bugs
Periodical:
National Wildlife
Year:
2002
Volume:
40
Subject:
Insects Nysius wekiuicola Wekiu bug
Summary:
This document describes a green, soft-bodied, inch-long, voracious killer caterpillar that lives only in Hawaii and hides in the lush Hawaiian rain forest. Upon first glance, this insect looks like any other gentle, non-threatening, plant-eating inchworm. However, upon closer examination, one will find that this caterpillar is capable of snapping it body backward and sinking its three pairs of wicked-looking tarsal claws into its prey and it seems that at least 18 species of killer caterpillars have evolved to fill the ecological niches that are preying mantises occupy elsewhere. However, carnivorous caterpillars are not Hawaii's only insect oddballs. There are also flightless flies, a terrestrial water treader, underground tree crickets, wekiu or summit vampire bugs, that are endemic to Hawaii and 24 species of damselflies that mostly likely evolved from a single species through adaptive radiation. Hawaii also has the only documented case of terrestrial-breeding damselflies naiads (Megalagrion oahuense) that live in damp leaf litter on the forest floor and is also home to the picture-wing (Drosophila) insect of which there are 110 known species that appear to have evolved from one or two species that made it to the island of Kauai approximately five million years ago. Also described are cave creatures such as the tree crickets that have never known a tree, water treaders that walk on slime-coated cave walls, and plant hoppers. While ancestral insects got here by accident, i.e., blown by the wind, floating on a raft of debris or as highhikers on migrating seabirds, many of these rare native insects are increasingly facing many problems since native host plants are being overrun by exotic vegetation, bulldozed for development, or chewed to oblivion by introduced goats, sheep or pigs. These insects are also being threatened by alien competitors and predators -- insects that were brought to Hawaii deliberately to control crop pests and by animals that have arrived as accidental stowaways, such as the insect-eating frogs that were hidden on potted plants. In addition ants, cockroaches, termites, mosquitos, and yellow jackets that were unknown to Hawaii until brought here through human activity. However, a journey has begun toward the recovery of these threatened insects.
Label:
Insects
URL:
https://www.nwf.org/Magazines/National-Wildlife/2002/Of-Killer-Caterpillars-and-Vampire-Bugs
Date:
August/September 2002
Collection:
Periodicals