BIG BUG!
Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
May 6, 2012 11:17 pm
What is this?! I was found in a baseball field in early May…so late spring although we are having summer weather lately. There were four or five of them in the area. This is a smaller one. It’s not the best picture but I would describe it as a beetle/moth sort of mix. Maybe a large water bug? Any ideas?
Signature: SCARED!
Giant Water Bug
Dear SCARED!,
We really love your offbeat photograph of a Giant Water Bug, an aquatic insect that also flies quite well and is attracted to strong lights at night, like around a baseball field, and that has earned them another common name: Electric Light Bug. Giant Water Bugs are also called Toe-Biters, allegedly because of the number of people, probably mainly young boys, who step on them on the bottoms of ponds and swimming areas while barefoot.
¶ Posted 07 May 2012 § ‡ ° Real World Silt Stridder?
Location: Pavement parking lot, Rochester NY
May 6, 2012 12:27 am
Hello,
I am a bug lover and this one certainly intrigued me! I found it just chilling in a parking lot at 3:00 in the morning. It was 4 inches long, and though it looks like a hard shell, I touched it and it seemed very soft. Its eyes were huge and it had what looked like fake claws. It did not move until I went to pick it up and it moved quite quickly for its awkward body structure; almost as it should be an underwater creature. The closest representation I can find is a Silt Strider, a mythical creature in a video game, haha! So your help would be greatly appreciated in identifying it for me, I would love to find out!
Thank you!
Signature: Jessica Carley
Toe-Biter
Hi Jessica,
This is a Giant Water Bug, also known as a Toe-Biter or Electric Light Bug. You were astute to recognize it as an aquatic species, and it is quite graceful when swimming. It can also fly quite well. We suspect you found it in the parking lot because it was attracted to the lights. We are linking to an image of a Silt Strider on DeviantART.
Daniel,
Wow! That is awesome, thank you so much for identifying this for me! Your website is going to be my new favorite!
Thanks,
Jessica
¶ Posted 06 May 2012 § ‡ ° What is this?
Location: Green Valley, AZ
April 16, 2012 4:53 pm
Could you please help identify this bug. It was found south of Tucson, AZ.
Signature: Josh O
Giant Water Bug
Hi Josh,
You have found a Giant Water Bug in the family Belostomatidae, the largest True Bugs in North America. Most western species are smaller, and we rarely get reports from the west of members of the genus Lethocerus, but that is what you have found. BugGuide only reports one species from Arizona, and that is Lethocerus medius. Giant Water Bugs are frequently called Toe-Biters because they can give a painful bite to swimmers that encounter them at the bottom of ponds, or Electric Light Bugs because they are frequently attracted to powerful lights. Though they are aquatic, Giant Water Bugs are also strong fliers which suits them well if their ponds dry out.
¶ Posted 17 April 2012 § ‡ ° Large flying insect with claws
Location: Tacoma, WA, USA
April 10, 2012 12:34 am
I found this giant in our front yard at 8pm this evening (04/09/12). I spotted it darting through the air and thought it was a bird. Then it hit one of our windows and landed, belly up on our front porch. I’ve been looking through online insect photo databases with no luck at all. Other details: It is about 2.5 inches long. In the photo, it is sitting on top of a quarter (to add size perspective). This bug is alive and seems to be healthy and uninjured (I’m keeping it in a ventilated jar in our back yard, with plans to release it soon). It is dormant for long periods, but starts moving around a lot more whenever I bring it inside. On closer examination, I made out what look like two little claws at the end of each leg.
I would be so grateful if you could help me identify this thing! Could it be native to this area (Washington State)? If not, where is it from?!
Signature: Lacey
Toe-Biter
Dear Lacey,
This is a Giant Water Bug in the genus Lethocerus, commonly called a Toe-Biter or an Electric Light Bug. It is most likely Lethocerus americanus. These are aquatic True Bugs that are found in ponds and other bodies of water with still water, but they are also quite adept at flight as you witnessed, a characteristic that serves them well if their habitat dries out. For more information, see this online article by Paul M. Choate courtesy of the University of Florida.
Wow, a giant water bug! Thank you so much for taking the time to get back to me. I really appreciate your response. I had no idea such an unusual bug even existed around here. Very exciting
Thanks again!
Lacey
¶ Posted 11 April 2012 § ‡ ° large (3” -4”?) water insect
Location: Madera Canyon, 20mi. south of Tucson, AZ
April 6, 2012 5:44 pm
What is this?
It was in a quiet pool at the edge of a mountain stream. We photographed it while still in the water.
Signature: GNB Arnold
Giant Water Bug
Dear GNB Arnold,
This is one of the Giant Water Bugs in the family Belostomatidae, and we believe it is a member of the genus Abedus that is found in the western states. The parenting behavior of this genus is quite interesting. The female cements the eggs to the back of the male who carries them about until they hatch. It is a rare instance of paternal parenting among insects. See BugGuide for additional information on the genus Abedus.
Giant Water Bug
Location: Rochester, NY
March 27, 2012 11:34 pm
Dear WTB,
I found this beautiful Giant Water Bug lost in my garage a few nights back. I brought her in the house to take a few pictures and set her loose on my front porch. We normally leave the garage door closed with the lights off so I have no idea how or why she decided to come in but her visit made my night. I hope you like the picture!
Signature: Jenn K
Giant Water Bug
Hi Jenn,
Thank you for sending us your photograph. We have been calling Giant Water Bugs by the name Toe-Biters for years, and it may be an undeserving name. We don’t believe we have ever received a report of a person being bitten anywhere by a Giant Water Bug, much less on the toe. That name allegedly originated from hapless swimmers being bitten while swimming in lakes and ponds. Giant Water Bugs are also called Electric Light Bugs because they are attracted to lights. Now that temperatures have risen, albeit unseasonably early in the eastern states, we expect the reports of Giant Water Bugs to come pouring in.
¶ Posted 28 March 2012 § ‡ ° Identification help
Location: Red Rock Canyon Nat. Conservation Area, Las Vegas
March 20, 2012 10:47 pm
I think this is a Giant Water Bug in the genus Abedus, but I’ve not been able to find images of Abedus or its relatives showing the paddle shape on the end of the front legs. Thus, I’m wondering if my ID is incorrect. This is about 2.5 cm long and was netted from a riparian pool
Signature: Bruce Lund
Giant Water Bug
Hi Bruce,
We agree that this is a Giant Water Bug in the genus Abedus. Most photos do not provide a good view of the raptorial front legs, however we did find an image on BugGuide that shows the well developed forelegs. Though not as impressively large as the Eastern Toe-Biter, Western Giant Water Bugs in the genus Abedus are fascinating creatures. The male carries the eggs on his backwhere they have been cemented by the female, providing some degree of paternal care, a relative rarity in the insect world.
Giant Water Bug
Thanks once again, Daniel. I’ll look at Bugguide again – I missed the
image you found.
Bruce Lund
¶ Posted 21 March 2012 § ‡ ° Giant Water Bug
Location: Queensland, Australia
January 26, 2012 12:50 am
Hi guys,
Hope you like these shots of a giant water bug that was hanging around banging into a shiny piece of stainless steel in my carport. They will often mistake a reflective surface for water and attempt to drop into it.
The bug played dead when I got close to it and it allowed me to turn it over for a shot of its piercing mouthparts. It was determined not to give itself away until I picked it up and took it over to some long grass. When I dropped it on the grass it quickly righted itself and flew away.
Signature: aussietrev
Water Scorpion
Hi Trevor,
The very flattened body and extremely long, posterior breathing tube indicates that this is a Water Scorpion, and not a closely related Giant Water Bug. Interestingly, we found a photos of a Water Scorpion from Australia submitted by you in 2008 in our archive. We decided to do a bit more research and we found the AusEmade website that has a photo of an Australian Water Scorpion from Simpsons Gap that is identified as Laccotrephes tristis and contains this information: “One of the interesting looking insects found swimming in the pools is the Water Scorpion, whose other common name is Toe-biter. These strange looking creatures are carnivores, feeding on other aquatic organisms that they can capture including tadpoles, small frogs and small fish. They swim with the tip of their long needle like tail breaking the water surface, acting as a breathing siphon. With their large pincer-like forelegs used for seizing their prey, Water Scorpions can inflict a nasty nip, although they are also known to play dead when disturbed. Once they have grasped their prey, they inject a venom that liquefy the prey from the inside, which enables the Water Scorpion to suck out the prey’s body fluid.” The Identification and Ecology of Australian Freshwater Invertebrates website also has some good information. The Atlas of Living Australiahas a distribution map.
Water Scorpion
If you look closely at your close-up photos, you can see tiny red spots which we suspect are Mites. Several sources indicate a common name of Toe-Biter which is shared with the North American Giant Water Bugs.
Water Scorpion
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