1. By Christine Kim

2. Habitat Weta are nocturnal and live in a variety of habitats including: pasture, shrub, forests, and caves. Weta excavate holes under stones, rotting logs, or in trees. They sometimes occupy pre-formed burrows.

3. Description Many weta are large by insect standards and Some species are among the largest and heaviest in the world. Their physical appearance is like a katydid or long-horned grasshopper or a cricket, but the hindcricket legslegs are enlarged and usually very spiny. Many are wingless.

4. Diet Different species have different diets. Most weta are predators or omnivores preying on other invertebrates, but the tree and giant weta eat mostly lichens, leaves, flowers, seed-heads and fruit.

5. Other Information Weta is the name applied to about 70 insectinsect speciesspecies endemic to New Zealand. There areendemicNew Zealand many similar species around the world, most are in the southern hemisphere. The name comes from the Māori word 'wētā' and is theMāori same in the plural (like 'sheep'). The Māori for the Giant Weta is 'wētā punga' (lumpy or jointed weta), sometimes rendered in English as 'god of ugly things'.