Examine the Life Cycle of an Insect

As you know, butterflies and moths are arthropods that are insects (with 6 legs, 3 body parts and 4 wings).

After the female butterfly has laid its eggs, usually under a leaf, about how long will it be before they hatch out?

The larva that hatches out of the egg is called a caterpillar.

Look at these caterpillars.

What do you notice about how they are designed, compared with an adult butterfly?

Caterpillars eat and grow until they are ready to move to the next stage of their life cycle.

Many caterpillars spin themselves a silken wrapping, inside which they make this change. Others dangle from a branch or your shed roof.

What is this stage known as?

Remember the grasshoper’s African relative – the locust – that we met in the introduction?

Well, after the adults have mated, the female locust lays her eggs in a layer of damp sand.

How do you think they will be incubated, to stay at the correct temperature, so that they hatch?

Here is a hopper – a young locust:

Compare that with an adult locust:

What sort of differences can you see between them?

You’ve seen that insects like butterflies go through a complete metamorphosis in their life cycles, changing from caterpillar to pupa to adult.

Most insects, like the locust, have an incomplete metamorphosis, where the young locusts grow through several stages in their life cycle.

How does the hopper, covered by a hard exoskeleton, manage to grow?

While the hoppers are fairly destructive, eating crops, etc., once they moult into an adult, their destructive ability is far greater.

Name two abilities that the adult locust has which the hopper does not have.