Thanks for watching!
Hi everyone, my name is Kathy and I come from Ichuka. Has anybody been to Ichuka?
No one come from Ichuka? Yeah, we've got a few people that have been to Ichuka and we're here
to do some really good stuff for you so there's lots of things behind you that you can have a look at
when I'm finished having a little bit of a chat. Who can tell me what their favourite Australian animal is?
Yep. An emu? A snake? I like snakes. A cat? A koala. Have you got a favourite Australian animal?
What do you like to do? Butterfly. Butterfly, there's lots of loads around this year. What's your favourite Australian animal?
A koala. Do you know something all of those animals are all great Australian animals but guess what?
I like bugs. Bugs are the things I like and did you know that there's more bugs than anything else by lots and lots?
So about 90% of all the animals in Australia are not kangaroos and koalas and snakes, they're bugs.
So bugs are pretty cool and pretty important. So I might need someone to give me a bit of a hand in a minute
so someone who likes dressing up and looking really beautiful. That'd be me. Oh, that'd be you!
Because we want to talk a little bit about bugs. So yeah, okay, come on, come and be my bug person.
What's your name? Arnica. So Arnica's going to help me talk about a little bit about bugs.
So bugs are not just everything. What do you think a bug is? What's something that's a bug?
A small creature with the same size and an etymology.
That's the fantastic words there. We'll talk about that one in a minute.
A rhino beetle. A rhino beetle is a fantastic bug, yep.
Yes, they're small and sometimes they are.
They do. Does anyone know something else about a bug? No?
Okay, so bugs are all of that. When we're talking about bugs, we're really talking about all those little things
that don't have a skeleton on the inside of their body. So they've actually got a skeleton on the outside of their body.
So that's mostly what we're talking about. When we talk about bugs, sometimes we talk about snails and slugs and things like that as well
and they don't have an exoskeleton or an outside skeleton, but we talk about them too. They're kind of bugs.
They're a bit buggy too, so we can talk about all those things. Oh, and my amazing bugs have blown off.
Okay, so let's start by thinking about this really special group of bugs that you've probably all heard of and they're called insects.
Who can tell me something about an insect? Yep, they have six legs. Did you know that an insect had six legs?
Yeah? What else do we know about an insect? They're really hard to keep out of the house.
And especially at the moment, they're really hard to keep out of the house. Are you having a cricket plague here?
Yeah. So we've got them everywhere. Have you had the grasshoppers as well? You had the locas?
No, but just grasshoppers. Have you got anything else in plague proportions at the minute?
Earwigs. Oh, earwigs? Yeah, the earwigs are starting to come. And millipedes.
Yeah, so they're all great bugs. Okay, but what we're going to do is have a look at George. This is my friend George.
And George is not a bug. George is a bit like us, a bit like what we might look like if we took off our skin.
So this is all muscle, all down here, and all ligaments that join us all together.
And you guys can't see very well, but around this side, you might turn him around a bit so you can see as well.
Can you see all this? This is all the ribs. Yeah? You got ribs? Yeah, of course you have.
And this is intestine. And what's this under here? What are these? What are these white things that go down here?
Bones. Bones. And what are your bones? What do they do?
They join all together. Do you know what the job of your bones or your skeleton is?
What do they do to help you? They do help you? They do? Yeah?
You'd be a big blob of jelly sitting on the floor, wouldn't you? Yeah. So we didn't want to be big blobs of jelly.
So we've got our skeleton inside us which keeps us, holds us up, gives us strength, and your ribs protect the things that are inside you.
So your heart and your lungs are all getting some protection from it, from your skeleton.
But bugs don't have that. Bugs have a different sort of skeleton. Bugs have their skeleton on the outside of their bodies.
And we're going to make, sorry, what was your name? Anika. Anika into an insect.
So to make Anika into an insect, she needs to have an exoskeleton or an outside skeleton.
So this is going on your arms. Very nice. Beautiful. So now we've got a bit of an exoskeleton happening.
But Anika's only got one, two, three, four legs and we want to make her into an insect.
How many legs does an insect have? Six legs. So we'll just give her a couple more around here.
How are we? These are looking pretty good.
Now she's looking a bit more buggy. Beautiful. She's looking beautiful.
And we need a few more things to make her into a bug.
Does anything know anything about bug's eyes? Has anyone had a look at some bug's eyes over there? What do you know about them?
They have like all the different compound eyes.
Fantastic. They have compound eyes. So we need Anika to have some compound eyes. Here's our eyes.
So we need to put these on because, yeah, we won't put them on your face. We'll just put them up here.
Okay, can you still see? Oh, I nearly broke my compound eyes. So bugs have beautiful compound eyes that look like this.
So they're not like ours.
Well, they also have something coming out of their head. What do they have coming out of their antennas?
Do you know what the job of the antennas is? Yep. Fantastic. That's what we wanted.
So our antennas have got a nose on it because bugs smell with their antennas.
So we'll put these on, Anika. She's looking pretty fantastic now.
Pretty cool. What else do we need, Robin?
Here. Where do they hear?
If you were a cricket, Anika, you would have these beautiful ears, lift your leg.
She's getting really crazy.
On.
Oh, it doesn't matter. Anika doesn't mind hearing upside down, do you?
If she was a cricket, she'd be hearing out of her knees.
Well, that's pretty cool, isn't it? Do you think she makes a pretty good insect?
She does. She makes a fabulous insect. Let's give her a big clap because she looks pretty cool.
Alright, we'll take all this off her now.
Robin needs to glue that one back together, that eye.
Andressa.
Take her legs off and her arms off.
And her ears. Do you want to keep those ears? I don't think so.
We'll take them off as well. Hang on to my shoulder.
Fantastic. Thank you, Anika. You were fantastic. You make a very good bug.
Yeah, give her a big clap.
Okay, I've got some of my own bugs that I bought because I love bugs, so I bought some of my own I'd like you to meet.
And we've got a special guest bug today. We've got Charlie, and what's your name?
Ben.
Ben, are you going to hang on to Charlie for me?
So Charlie lives here in Colack and he's Ben's...
She?
She.
Come on Charlie, hop on.
Hop on.
Aren't you going to stand out here?
So this is Charlie and he's Ben's pet and this is Twiggy.
So Twiggy and Charlie are both spiny leaf insects.
What can you tell me about Charlie, Ben?
She has spikes to protect her.
She does have spikes to protect her from birds and things and we'll bring her around.
You might like to go around and show everybody a bit closer what Charlie looks like.
She won't bite you. She's not scary. She's really beautiful.
And in a little while you'll be able to have a hold of her.
She's got little spikes on her feet because she's got to hang on to the tree.
She's right up the top and she hangs up so down like this.
No, they don't because they hang on really tight.
And they do sway in the breeze like this so if it was a breeze.
And they just look like dead leaves so I'll bring her over in a tissue.
How?
Because the boy one doesn't look like this.
He's not all curled up like this.
He looks a bit different and see her tiny little wheels?
I think my friend has one.
I know that a girl has a much more.
Yeah, around your bottom?
When do you want to keep them as pets? Where do you get them?
Okay, so guys these animals live in Queensland and they live in gum trees.
They just eat gum leaves so they're a fantastic pet and very easy, very clean.
There's no smell and they're just the most gorgeous creatures.
They only live for two to three years at maximum.
So these are the female ones.
The male ones have got quite a straight body.
They look different.
The females have got tiny little wing buds so they can't fly.
The males have got wings so they can fly.
But these are one of the animals where girls really rule
because you don't need to have a male to have babies.
The female will produce eggs without a male
and if you hatch those eggs all of those eggs will be female eggs.
For female babies. So they'll be like little clones.
Yep.
They jump a tiny little bit sometimes if they get a fright.
If you go to pick one up sometimes and you're not careful
they might jump a little bit.
But when they're this big, because she's quite big now
they can't really jump when they're this big can they?
You've never seen them jump?
No, a little bit when they're little.
All their eggs are female.
How are they male?
Well there are males because if the male and the female get together
then they produce eggs that are male and females.
And we still need to have the males because if we just had those same females
over and over and over we wouldn't be getting any diversity
and that means we wouldn't be getting those tiny little changes
and we need that for the population to be really healthy
so we kind of still need the males.
So this is Twiggy and Charlie.
Does anyone have any other questions about them?
I've got a little one here too I'll bring out at the end
for you to have a look at.
Yeah, a little one of these ones.
Okay, yes.
There is something.
It is a stick insect.
There's about 150 different sorts of stick insects in Australia
and this is one of them.
And it's called a spiny leaf insect, yeah?
They've got really thin legs.
They're kind of like...
Body that sways, yeah?
Yeah.
Yeah, because they've got really strong gripping feet.
So one of the other really cool things about them,
when they lay their eggs,
they just drop them from the top of a gum tree
so they don't do anything else special with them.
They just give a bit of a flick of their tail
and the eggs just drop out
and they sort of flick them all over the place.
And there's an ant that likes to eat a little bit of the egg
and those ants come along and pick them up,
pick up the eggs and take them down into the ant's nest
and then they nibble off the top of the egg.
But the rest of the egg,
the special bit that's got the baby inside,
it just sits in the ant's nest and it's still safe.
So it's a way for these animals to keep their eggs safe.
So how cool is that?
And then when they're born,
you can have a look at the eggs.
You can see the little knob on the top of the eggs.
And when the babies are born,
they run out quickly up onto the tree,
but they actually look, when they're little babies,
they look just like the ants.
So the ants don't know they're any different.
So they think they're just another ant.
So they let them go.
If they lose their legs, they can grow back.
Do you tell us about that?
Can you tell us that, Ben?
If they lose their legs, they can grow back.
Yeah.
So if they lose their legs because...
We just want to live right now.
Yeah.
Well, if you were, you'd be growing your leg back.
Yeah, you've got to, you've got to molt.
You've got to change your skeleton.
Yeah.
Yes, there would be.
So that's some stick insect eggs.
Yeah.
So we're going to put these ones back
because I've got some other ones to show you.
Do you want to get...
I'll get legs if you get that one from up the top.
You want to get the baby or you're right?
Yeah, yeah.
Do you want to get the baby legs?
Thank you.
Do you want to get some more?
No, thank you, darling, because this one can fly
and we don't want to lose her.
Is that a male?
This is a female, but she's big.
So this is another stick insect.
That's a male.
Yeah.
So this one's called a Goliath stick insect.
So this one comes from Queensland too
and we have to be a bit careful.
This is a female, but she can fly,
so we have to be careful.
So she's the second biggest Australian stick insect.
So this one's called a Goliath stick insect
and then there's another one that's called a Titan stick insect.
So this little one, this is a baby one of these.
So this is what it looks like
before it's grown as big as she is.
So to grow, to grow,
an insect needs to take off its skeleton
and grow a new one underneath
and it's called molting.
So each time they molt,
they grow a new skeleton that's a bit bigger.
Do they always have it always the same?
Well, that one's going to end up looking like this.
So on her last molt,
she's going to change from being like that
and suddenly she's going to look green
and she's going to have these beautiful stripes
and she's going to have her beautiful wings.
So each time they change,
they can look a little bit different.
Yes, that is a Goliath stick insect.
And these just eat gum leaves as well.
So they're another great pet.
They do the same thing.
They're like in sex rule, don't they?
This one, the male has got a long straight body.
They look slightly different.
When they're early, young,
it can be quite difficult.
But as they get a bit older,
the male's got a little lump on the end of his abdomen
so you can tell the difference.
Okay, so that's the Goliath stick insect.
And the baby Goliath insect is the camouflage.
It's just amazing.
He'll just sit with his front legs out like this.
I took them outside one day.
I thought I'd get a photo of him on a tree
so that I could turn around
and I took me quite a while to find him again.
He was just amazing.
Yeah, so they're really beautiful animals.
Okay, so these animals, you can buy them.
They can actually send them through the post from Queensland.
So you can get them as a young nymph through the post
but they do make fabulous pets.
They're really fantastic and really beautiful.
Really beautiful.
It's strange but I think they're beautiful.
Is that all in there?
No, we won't.
So how many mums and dads like cockroaches?
Is there any mums and dads?
Have you?
I like cockroaches.
You like cockroaches, fantastic.
I like mums and dads cringe at the thought of cockroaches
and mostly those cockroaches that you're cringing at
are ones that have come from Europe
and they're not really even our cockroaches.
So our cockroaches, we've got some beautiful cockroaches
and I've got Rodney Roach to show you.
So I'll bring Rodney out.
Is he big?
He's pretty big.
So this is Rodney Roach
and Rodney Roach is a giant burrowing cockroach.
So he comes from Queensland
in northern New South Wales
and he will live in a burrow up to a metre deep
that he'll dig in the sand.
So absolutely beautiful
and you can notice how slowly he's walking.
He's not a really fast running one
and you can see...
You can see, I'll bring him around
that he's got really strong legs for digging
because he digs big holes to live in.
He has spiky legs.
He does have spiky legs.
Just a little bit.
So these cockroaches actually produce live babies
so they don't even have eggs
or they have eggs inside but they have live babies.
That's incredible. I've seen a little one at school.
I've seen a little one at school.
That's incredible.
They protect themselves.
Well they've got this big, big strong
exoskeleton on the outside
and they live a lot of the day
and they only come out at night.
They live most of the time inside their burrow
and they come out and guess what they eat?
They just eat old gum leaves.
Excuse me, can I have a closer look?
Yes you can.
Say hi Rodney.
Hi Rodney.
He's good.
He's very good isn't he?
Yeah.
Okay so that's Rodney.
So one of the other really cool things
about some of the cockroaches,
cockroaches are renowned to be
to be really tough animals
and there's some cockroaches
that can live up to 10 days without a head.
That's how tough they are.
So, oh bye.
Wow.
The next animals I wanted to show you
are actually ping and pong.
Oh my god.
Ping hasn't come out to visit
but pong's come out.
They're giant snails.
These are giant panda snails.
Yeah he doesn't want to come out.
Those are from...
So these are land snails
that come from New South Wales
and Queensland again.
So where do they come from?
From Queensland.
They have a big ping to come out
but he's not going to.
See their big black antennae?
Yeah.
Look at those.
And ping and pong like to eat cucumber.
So we feed them lots of cucumbers.
They're massive.
Where do you find them?
Queensland has such big queens.
Queensland has great bugs.
And they're called panda snails
because of their black antennae.
Pretty cool.
Yeah.
So they have a great big fleshy foot.
Like that.
And ping's even bigger
but ping's not being very cooperative
so he's not coming out.
Pretty cool.
Panda snails aren't endangered.
No, panda snails aren't
but some of our land snails are endangered.
Yeah.
But panda snails aren't.
Did anyone not see ping and pong?
So the last animal I wanted to show you
was not an insect either.
It's an arachnid.
Does anyone know what an arachnid is?
That's a spider.
And it's not even a spider.
It's something else.
Yeah, that's an arachnid.
Mine's not a spider.
Does anyone know something else
that might be an arachnid?
Yeah.
Mine's a scorpion.
I've got Dora the Explorer.
Dora the Explorer is a
Flinders Rangers scorpion
so she comes from over near Adelaide
and she's really beautiful.
She's a girl scorpion.
She's a little bit poisonous
but not very much.
So if she bites you,
it would be just like a bee sting.
So usually,
scorpions that have got really big claws
out the front,
usually catch their prey with their claws
so they don't have a very poisonous sting.
If you've got one with quite little
nippers out the front,
then you have to be a bit more careful.
But Dora is actually quite a docile
scorpion and she's very lovely.
But one of the really cool things
about scorpions
is that they glow in UV light.
So
if I shine a UV light on Dora,
she'll glow.
And scientists think that maybe
because there's some UV light in the moon
when scorpions go out to hunt,
it makes her shine
when bugs come over to have a look
at what this shiny thing is
and what does she do?
And eats them up.
So she eats crickets
at my place
and she's pretty keen on crickets.
So I'll bring Dora around.
We might sort of have to come in around it
to make it a bit dark so we can see her.
So we can see her with the...
Oh, I got that
from a pet shop.
See her?
See how she shines?
She will bite.
Does she bite with? Where is it?
On the tail.
Yeah, on the tail.
She actually grabs her food
with her nippers at the front.
Is there any food in there?
No, she doesn't have any food
because she doesn't have to have something
to eat every day.
She's not very big.
No, because we don't have huge ones in Australia.
Okay.
See how she shines?
She does shine.
She does shine.
I will come around.
See how she shines?
That's awesome.
She's pretty cool, isn't it?
Make it a bit dark.
Come in here and make a little bit of a tunnel
and we'll make it a bit dark
and you can see how shiny she is.
Pretty cool?
Yeah.
And we'll bring some around here.
Make it a bit dark.
We need to huddle in a bit.
Don't put your fingers in, but look how shiny she is.
How beautiful and shiny she is.
How about that?
Is that cool?
That's door.
She's pretty cool.
We'll make it a bit dark here too.
So that's a UV light.
Can you see?
Yeah.
Okay.
Well, everybody, that's the end of my bit of a bug show.
We've got some other great buggy things here.
You can have a look at some great things
under the microscope and some great water bugs.
Yes, they can.
I'll do that in a second.
You're very welcome.
