Daddy Long-legs.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20543, 19 February 1935, Page 6

Daddy Long-legs.

Nature Notes.

By James Drummond, F.L.S.. F.Z.S. gNTOMOLOGISTS have found it impossible to discover any utilitarian use for the lanky legs of insects called daddy longlegs. They break off very easily, and their owners seem to get along well without therq. The legs of the males often are much l.onger than the legs of the females. Other parts of the body may be elongated. Some species are characterised by a long proboscis, as long as the whole body. In other species, the wings are elongated to an unusual degree. On the whole, daddy long-legs may be accepted as a type of fragility; but they have been found on high mountains, crawling in a temperature below freezing point, when the ground was covered deeply with snow, and in mines 500 ft deep. To New Zealanders, they have a special interest on account of the fact that there are few other countries in the world where they are so abundant. They are probably the only large and important group of insects in which New Zealand exceeds Australia. In most groups Australia is immeasurably richer than New Zealand. Australia has in abundance many sorts of insects never found in New Zealand. Yet New Zealand has twice as many species of daddy long-legs, or crane-flies, to use another of their names, as Australia has. New Zealand has 500, Australia 250.