Giant Canterbury Weta (Deinacrida sp.)

The Canterbury Museum houses about 5000 specimens of weta, some preserved in ethanol but most pinned, one of them is this enigmatic form that may or may not constitute a distinct species.

Not much is known about this one specimen besides that it was collected sometimes during the late 1880s in Canterbury, New Zealand, and that it apparently is a juvenile female.

If this form turns out to be indeed a distinct species, it is now extinct, since species of its genus only survive on some small offshore islands but not on New Zealand’s main islands.

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edited: 15.05.2021