Living World – Insects

Investigate insects found in New Zealand to answer questions about life cycles, classification, conservation and biosecurity. Start by watching our webinar  All about insects.

Below are links to a wide range of Science Learning Hub resources primarily aimed at primary teachers and related to insects in the Living World strand of the New Zealand Curriculum.

All about insects

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Insects offer stimulating content with which teachers can feed student curiosity and grow science knowledge and capabilities.

Rights: The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato

Referencing Hub media

The Super Insects article has all of Countdown’s Super Insect teacher resources available as free downloadables – including an overview poster, 10 activity cards and a cross-curricular activity bonus.

• Native insects

• Life cycles

• Honey bees

• Butterflies

• Innovative ideas

• Biosecurity and biocontrol

• Monitoring

• More on insects

• Useful links

Native insects

The islands that make up this country are home to a vast number of species found nowhere else in the world. Learn about some of our native insects.  Explore this further in our article What’s so special about insects?

Last of the species?

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This poster gives some examples of just three of the thousands of invertebrates that are listed as threatened or at risk in New Zealand.

Illustrations by Emma Scheltema

Download the poster here.

Rights: New Zealand insect cards project

Referencing Hub media

• Insect taxonomy – article

• Te aitanga pepeke – article 

• Aquatic insect life – article

• Insects – physical characteristics – article

• Label the insect – activity

• Label the wētā – interactive

• Label the cicada – interactive

• The five most diverse insect orders – interactive

• New Zealand aquatic insects – interactive

• New Zealand's unique ecosystems – introductory article with links to media, articles and activities.

• Glow-worms – article

• Cave wētā – article

• Wētā – article

Wētā

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An example of one of the drawers full of specimens found at Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research. This shows the range of wētā found in New Zealand.

Rights: The University of Waikato Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato

Referencing Hub media

• Building homes for tree wētā – activity

• Redesigning wētā houses – article

• Vegetable caterpillar – article

• Fred the thread – article

• Science and literacy – using Fred the Thread – activity

• Discovering new species – collection of resources based on Fred the Thread

• Our elusive native butterflies – article

• Middle Earth wasps – article

• Insect antennae – article

• Honeydew ecosystem (scale insects) – article

• Insects and forest ecosystems – article

• Honeydew: The Food of the Ngahere – video

• Constructing food webs (scale insects) – activity

• Insect mihi – activity

• Moth collecting – activity

• Identifying bugs – activity

• Rearing insects – activity

• Make a wanted poster – activity

• City of bugs – Connected article

Life cycles

Insect life cycles have many similarities and differences, making them an ideal way to learn about life processes.

• New Zealand native butterflies – article

• Monarch butterflies – article

• White butterfly life cycle – activity

• Monarch butterfly life cycle – interactive

• Rearing moths to observe life cycles – activity

• Insect metamorphosis – image
  
  Glow-worm life cycle – image

• Vegetable caterpillar fungi – video

• Parasitoid wasp life cycle – article

Bees

Honey bee are the most important pollinators of many cultivated food crops and other flowering plants. See our bees topic for more.

Honey bee on flower

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This honey bee has pushed its head into a flower to search for nectar. Pollen from the stamens will rub off on its body and get carried to another flower.

Rights: Neville Gardner

Referencing Hub media

• Pollination – introductory article with links to media, articles and activities

• Pollination role-plays – activity

• Honey to heal – introductory article with links to media, articles and activities

• The Buzz of bees – article

• Bees – fun facts – article

• Bee-friendly insecticides – article

• Honey bee heroes – article

• Honeybees and Mānuka trees – article

People are doing heaps for kauri, kiwi and kākāpō but nothing for endemic butterfly species, yet insects are crucial to the ecosystem.

Butterflies and moths

Almost all of the butterflies in New Zealand are native and most are endemic. Compared to big, colourful species from other countries, our native butterflies are small and secretive. See our butterflies and moths topic for more.

Rauparaha’s copper

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The Rauparaha’s copper (Lycaena rauparaha) is said to be named after the famous warrior as its more heavily populated habitats are found along the coastal strip from Taranaki to Wellington where Te Rauparaha was most active.

Rights: Jérôme Albre

Referencing Hub media

• Investigating butterflies – introductory article with links to media, articles and activities

• Butterfly defense mechanisms – article

• New Zealand butterfly origins – article

• White butterflies – article

• Establishing butterfly transects – activity

• Tagging monarch butterflies for science – activity

• Butterflies (lower primary) – unit plan

• Butterflies (upper primary) – unit plan

• Helping the butterflies of Aotearoa New Zealand – article

• Ahi Pepe MothNet project – introductory article with links to media, articles and activities

• New Zealand moths – article

• Difference between butterflies and moths – article

• Making moth identification guides – article

• Our collection Kaitiakitanga and moths includes information and ideas about the pepe and pūrerehua of Aotearoa as well how children are learning about how to protect these amazing, secretive creatures.

Innovative ideas

Insects are used by science to inspire and solve a number of problems.

• Plant & Food Research and Etec Crop Solutions – Pheromone-based-Insecticide – video

Where we’re controlling insects without the side effects that other control tactics seem to have is a very satisfying thing personally because it’s helping to green New Zealand even further.

• Dung beetle mania – article

• Dung beetles released on farms – article

Biosecurity and biocontrol

Insects are both an issue and a solution when it comes to protecting New Zealand's natural and primary production environments. For more, browse the range of resources under the biosecurity and biocontrol topics.

Introduced pests:

• White butterflies – article

• German and common wasps – article

• Whangarei fruit fly find a worry – article

• – article

• Fighting a little bee mite – article

• Improving Aotearoa New Zealand’s biosecurity detection – article (with a focus on the fall armyworm pest)

Biocontrol success stories:

• Bioforce – breeding bugs for biocontrol – article

• Irish wasp to the rescue – article

• Weevils eat pesky buddleia weeds – article

Monitoring

Find out what insects are in your local environment with these activities:

• Pollinator counts – insects and flowers

• Yellow pan traps – monitoring flying insects

• Pitfall traps – monitoring ground-dwelling insects

• Heath moth traps for monitoring moths

• Establishing butterfly transects

• Tagging monarch butterflies for science

Citizen science projects

• Participate in the New Zealand Mosquito Census and help scientists at Te Papa learn more about the various mosquitos in Aotearoa. 

• Global Earth Challenge is an international citizen science project that has a section on monitoring insect population changes.

More on insects

• Hi tech drones copy nature’s design – article

• New Zealand’s fish-eating spider – article

A spider preying on a fish

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Dolomedes sp. preying on a mountain galaxias (Galaxias olidus) on the bank of North Branch Creek near Goomburra, Queensland, Australia.

Rights: © Nyffeler M, Pusey BJ (2014) Fish Predation by Semi-Aquatic Spiders: A Global Pattern. PLoS ONE 9(6): e99459. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0099459 Photo by Peter Liley. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Referencing Hub media

• Poison comes in small packages – article

• Tree lobsters’ convergent evolution – article

• Deformed bee wing virus – image

• Gum leaf skeletoniser – image

• Wasp versus ant – image