"Tree lobsters" rediscovered on Australian island after supposed extinction

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Link. Tree lobsters indeed. Those things are huge! Supposed to have been extinct for the last 80 years after rats managed to get on to their island home after a shipwreck, the insects were rediscovered a few years ago at the top of a nearby island that looks like something from a science fiction movie.

Some of the insects supposed behaviours are quite interesting too (husbandry manual here). They form pair bonds, and their closest living relatives, stick insects from New Guinea, have been known to stay by the corpses of their dead partners and sometimes starve themselves to death.

2

Cripes, those are humongous bugs. It’s amazing that a little breeding colony survived on that tiny stalagmite-like island.

3

They did? That’s not how I remember Jurassic Park.

4

They still do, actually. About half of all known species of everything–eukaryotic or prokaryotic–are insects.

5

That’s awesome. I love lobster. Are they willing to ship?

6

Fascinating stuff.

I wish, though, that the author would get the name of the island right. It’s Lord Howe Island, not Howe Island, as he keeps calling it in the article.

I actually went to boarding school with some Lord Howe Island kids. There are only about 350 people living on the place, and we had 5 or 6 at my school.

7

Great quote from the article:

“The only thing to do was to go back up after dark, with flashlights and cameras, to see if the pooper would be out taking a nighttime walk.”

8

I’ve been sharing this all day. As a biologist who currently specializes in island biogeography and endemism, this makes me very, very happy.

9

This is old news though. I’ve been following this story for years!

10

I guess this is poor taste given the context, but… KILL IT WITH FIRE!!!

11

The island is cooler than the bugs.

12

Are there pics somewhere? I’m on my phone and not seeing any. (I may regret asking.)

13

Direct links to pictures:
Picture 1

Picture 2

14

:eek:!!

15

If there isn’t a secret lair for a supervillian in there, there damn well should be.

16

I think the first step in protecting the species should be to remove the “Lobster” from the name.

17

This is just awesome and amazing! Yay, bugs!

Yeah…as long as they’re in someone else’s backyard, hehe. But seriously…living for so long under just one bush? On one rock in the middle of the ocean? Holy shit…they deserve a parade :slight_smile:

18

Yet another example as to why I should never go to Australia.

19

Yeah, this is yet another example of creatures that are bigger down under, and correspondingly more likely to murder you. D:

20

I love that guy’s eyebrows.