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The Phasmatodea (also known as Phasmida or Phasmatoptera) are an order of insects whose members are variously known as stick insects, stick-bugs, walkingsticks, stick animals, or bug sticks. They are also occasionally referred to as Devil's darning needles, although this name is shared by both dragonflies and crane flies.
Learn about stick insects, also known as walking sticks, which are expert camouflage artists that mimic twigs and leaves. Find out how they live, feed, and defend themselves in the wild, and see stunning photos of different species.
Learn about stick insects, the world's longest insects that can camouflage and detach their legs. Find out how they live, eat, and reproduce in tropical and temperate forests.
- Stick Insects Can Regenerate Limbs. Should a bird or other predator grab hold of its leg, a stick insect can still make an easy escape. Using a special muscle to break it off at a weak joint, the imperiled insect simply sheds the leg in a defensive strategy is known as autotomy.
- Stick Insects Can Reproduce Without Males. Stick insects are a nation of Amazonians, able to reproduce almost entirely without males, using a process known as parthenogenesis.
- Stick Insects Even Act Like Sticks. Stick insects are so named for their effective camouflage among the woody plants where they feed. They're typically brown, black, or green, with thin, stick-shaped bodies that help them blend in as they perch on twigs and branches.
- Their Eggs Resemble Seeds. Stick insect mothers aren't the most maternal. While some stick insects females actually make an effort to hide their eggs—sticking them to leaves or bark or placing them in the soil—they typically drop eggs randomly on the forest floor, leaving the youngsters to whatever fate befalls them.
- They can grow up to two-feet long. Most stick insects are somewhere comfortably between half an inch (1.75cm) and 4 inches (10cm) long. There is one species, the Bornean stick insect Phobaeticus kirbyi, however, that reach an enormous 13 inches (33cm) long, making it the third-longest insect in the world!
- Their taxonomy is really complicated. As mentioned in the intro, scientists are still trying to sort all these twigs. While they look like mantids, stick insects are turning out to have a range of connections we didn’t expect.
- They have a range of defence mechanisms. They can play dead, known as ‘thanatosis’, where they are completely motionless. If that doesn’t work, they can also use ‘startle displays’, which means quite the opposite from playing dead, where they display bright colours and make loud noises to scare off predators!
- They can release stinky goo when threatened. Camouflage goes a really long way towards keeping stick insects safe. If an animal can’t see it, it’s less likely to eat it.
Walking sticks, or stick insects, are a group of highly camouflaged insects. They escape predation by blending into plant material. As their name suggests, they look just like sticks, and may even sway back and forth to more closely resemble a twig moving in the wind.
The common walkingstick or northern walkingstick (Diapheromera femorata) is a species of phasmid or stick insect found across North America. The average length of this species is 75mm (3 in) for males and 95mm (3.7 in) for females.
