The Giant Insects of St Helena Project

The British colony of St Helena is one of the most remote and little known locations on the planet. Situated in the South Atlantic it is excisable only four times a year by a long sea journey via mail boat. Like Conan Doyle`s Lost World it is home to giant creatures believed by science to be extinct!

In isolation from predators many species of insect on St Helena have grown to gigantic proportions. The most famous is the St Helena giant earwig. Discovered by the Danish entomologist Fabricius in 1798 Labidura herculeana is the world's largest earwig, growing to 3 inches in length. Due to it`s obscure habitat (it is found nowhere else) the monster was forgotten for nearly two centuries. It was rediscovered in 1962 when a pair of ornithologists searching for bird bones came upon some desiccated tail pincers of enormous size. In 1965 a team of entomologists discovered many of the creatures in deep burrows beneath large boulders in Horse Point Plain.

However, since then no more specimens have been seen. There have been several fruitless searches the last in 1988 by a two man team from London zoo. But the earwig's subterranean nature and remote location it is far from impossible that this titan of the Dermaptera still lurks in the remote regions of the land.

 The giant earwig is not the only mystery insect on St Helena. The even more obscure giant ground beetle and the St Helena dragonfly have not been seen since the 1900s.The Centre for Fortean Zoology intends to make the most comprehensive search for these lost creatures ever undertaken.

We will again require subsistence and travel fees for the project team, for the duration of the project.

• Collection Equipment

• Kite Nets

• Computer

• Specimen Jars

• Towels

• Small Dip Nets

• Camera and DV