MEDIA RELEASE
Tuesday 9 March 2010

Watch out! Baby bugs about!

Butterfly Creek is celebrating some new arrivals this week - 181 of them in fact!

Butterfly Creek’s wetapunga (giant weta) breeding programme has had its first success with a batch of baby wetapunga. So far 181 hatchlings have emerged and there may be more to come. This is a significant achievement as it is the first time this species has been bred in captivity in any large scale.

Paul Barrett, head of the programme, explains “Butterfly Creek staff have worked hard to re-create the ideal breeding environment for the wetapunga and were excited to see them eventually displaying all the correct behaviour such as burying their ovipositors deep in the soil. We were hopeful breeding would occur as all the indications were that the wetapunga were mating successfully and the females developing eggs”

After this stage it’s a long waiting game with an incubation period of 6 to 11 months. The hatchlings then squirm their way up through the soil to the surface. They hatch from the egg in the form of a pre-nymph, work their way up to the surface and then moult into the true nymph. Once they have hardened their skin they can then run and jump. At this stage they look like a tiny replica of the adult insect.

Currently the hatchlings are about the size of a fingernail. They will take around 12 months to grow to full adult size and weight. They are one of the world’s heaviest insects, weighing as much as a sparrow!

The focus for staff now is to meet the needs of these precious wee ones.

“They are lapping up the protein foods offered to them in the form of insects and fish food. They also get algae, green leaves, dead leaves, flowers and new shoots. We keep the temperature as close to that experienced on Little Barrier, Hauturu Island. It doesn’t get that hot over there in the forest so we keep them in an air-conditioned room which is maintained at 9 to 20 degrees Celsius”, Mr Barrett explains.

Butterfly Creek and the programme’s key sponsor, garden waste specialists Greenfingers, are delighted with the success and hope this will be the first of many batches.

Wetapunga are an endangered species, found only on Little Barrier Island. One of the key aims of the joint programme between Butterfly Creek and the Department of Conservation is to establish young wetapunga on other island retreats. Chris Green from the Department is working closely with the Motuora Restoration Society and the Supporters of Tiritiri Matangi Island to arrange releases of the wetapunga on Motuora and Tiritiri Islands within the next year. DOC and the community groups involved are very excited about the future of giant weta due to the new arrivals.

“This will provide a significant boost to the security of this iconic giant weta species, thanks to the highly successful breeding programme at Butterfly Creek”.

ends

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