Category Insects, Arachnids, and Bugs

Arabian Fat-Tailed Scorpion

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The Arabian Fat-Tailed Scorpion (Androctonus crassicauda) is a venomous arachnid. An arachnid, like the spider, has eight legs.

The Arabian Fat-Tailed Scorpion has grasping front claws, called pedipalps, and a thick, segmented tail that curves over its back. At the end of the tail is a venomous stinger called a telson. It is highly venomous to humans. 

The Arabian Fat-Tailed Scorpion is usually reddish-brown in colour, but it can also be brown to black. It does not have an inner skeleton (bones). Instead, like the spider, it has an exo-skeleton – an outer skeleton or shield that protects its body. The exo-skeleton is called the ecdysis. 

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CREATURE FEATURE: Shield-Tailed Scorpion

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The Shield-Tailed Scorpion (Apistobuthus pterygocercus) is a venomous arachnid. An arachnid, like the spider, has eight legs. It is not an insect, because an insect has six legs.

The Shield-Tailed Scorpion has grasping front claws, called pedipalps, and a narrow, segmented tail that curves over its back. At the end of the tail is a venomous stinger. It is usually a sandy-yellow colour. It does not have an inner skeleton (bones). Instead, like the spider, it has an exo-skeleton – an outer skeleton or shield that protects its body. The exo-skeleton is called the ecdysis. 

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Orange Ladybird Beetle

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The Orange Ladybird Beetle (Halyzia sedecimguttata) is an insect in the Coccinellidae family of ladybirds. It is also known as the Orange Ladybug or the Orange Lady Beetle. 

The Orange Ladybird Beetle has an oval and dome-shaped body. It is a striking orange colour with 16 (or less) large, creamy-white spots on its elytra (wing cases). It has 8 spots on each elytron. It has black compound eyes. Its antennae are light-brown, quite long, and slightly thickened at the ends. Its neck shield usually covers the head and shows orange colored spots. 

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Springtail

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The Springtail (Microfalcula delamarei) is a micro-small, wingless hexapod. A hexapod has three pairs of legs (6 legs), but it is not an insect. 

It is entognathous, which means that is has internal mouthparts in a gnathal (jaw) pouch. It is in the Collembola class and the Entomobryoidea super-family – like a terrestrial crustacean, because scientists think that it evolved from marine (saltwater) shrimp, crabs, and lobsters. Scientists first thought that it was an insect, but they have now changed the category to an entognathous animal.

The Springtail has three parts: the head capsule, a thorax (with three segments and 6 legs), and an abdomen (with five segments). Therefore, it looks like an insect. It has small antennae, two eyes, and mouthparts. The mouthparts have a pair of jaws. The two eyes are called composed eyes, because they are composed of 8 single eyes. It does not have a throat, so it breathes through a porous cuticle. 

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Common Tiger Butterfly

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The Common Tiger Butterfly (Danaus genutia) is an insect in the Nymphalidae family and Danainae group of brush-footed butterflies called the crows and tigers. It is also known as the Striped Tiger Butterfly. 

The Common Tiger Butterfly is similar to the Monarch Butterfly (Danaus plexippus). The Common Tiger Butterfly has tawny-brown wings with veins marked with broad black bands. The male has a pouch on the hindwing. Its wings have black margins with two rows of white spots. The undersides of its wings are similar to the uppersides, but paler. 

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Grasshopper Saga

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The Grasshopper Saga (Saga ephippigera ephippigera) is a medium-sized insect. It is in the Saginae sub-family of bush crickets, from the family of the Katydids. 

The Grasshopper Saga has varied colours, from light-green and dark-green to dark-brown or light-brown. Its head is usually darker than its body. The male has short wings, but the female is wingless. It has large antennae. Its legs have thorns.

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Common Sergeant Butterfly

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The Common Sergeant Butterfly (Athyma perius) is a medium-sized insect in the Nymphalidae family.

The male Common Sergeant Butterfly has black wings with white markings. The undersides of its wings are yellow with white markings edged with black. Its thorax is black with bluish spots, and its abdomen is brown with white bands. Its antennae are long. The female is blackish-brown with a double row of minute black dots on her wings.  

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Hissing Cockroach

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The Hissing Cockroach (Gromphadorhina oblongonota) is an insect in the roach family. It is also known as a Wide-Horned Hisser. 

The Hissing Cockroach is dark-brown to black with red-brown on its thick, waxy exo-skeleton.  It has orange-brown sections with small spots on each side. The male has thicker, hairier antennae than the female. The male also has horn-type structures on the pronotum (the front section of its thorax). Unlike most cockroaches, the Hissing Cockroach is wingless. It has 6 legs, with pads and hooks on its feet that enable it to climb. It can even climb smooth glass.

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Magicicada Great Eastern Brood

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The Magicicada (Magicicada) is a 13-year or 17-year periodical cicada, an insect in the order Hemiptera.

The Magicicada photographed are from the 17-year periodical cicadas of Brood X (Brood Ten), called the Great Eastern Brood, which emerged in 2004. Periodical cicadas are grouped into broods based on the calendar year when they emerge from the ground. There were an estimated 1.5 million of them in 2004. Every 17 years, it tunnels to the surface of the ground to breed. The next emergence of the Great Eastern Brood is in 2021. 

The adult Magicicada Great Eastern Brood had red eyes and a black thorax. Its wings are translucent with orange veins. The underside of its abdomen is black, orange, or striped with orange and black, depending on the species.

 

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Common Brimstone Butterfly

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The Common Brimstone Butterfly (Gonepteryx rhamni) is a medium-sized insect in the Pieridae family – white, yellow, and orange butterflies.

The male and female Common Brimstone Butterfly look different. The male has yellow wings with iridescence. The female has greenish-white wings with no iridescence. It has one small orange-brown spot on each of its four wings. Its body is dark-brown. It has medium-sized antennae.

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