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Project Noah Nature School
Haaniella echinata
A large nocturnal Phasmid insect resting on a leaf. Despite being 58mm long, this one is still a nymph. It needs to undergo few more instars to reach adulthood. It is brown in color to mimic twigs, wood and other dry vegetation debris. Other than being armed with spikes, it will also lift up it's rear and hind legs to display it's hidden bright cyan (or turquoise blue) mark as a warning sign to predators.
The nymphs are found on leaves of low growing plants on the forest floor in Tawau Hills Park, Tawau, Sabah.
>>>Map accuracy: 200m diameter. Spotted this with Dan during a night walk in one of the forest trails. This is one of the many H.echinata nymphs we found and yet we found no winged adults (imago) tonight. This species is one of the several similar looking Haaniella species endemic to Borneo. Dan's spotting of this http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/233... Another instar http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/257...
Spotted on Jan 23, 2014
Submitted on Apr 9, 2014
3 Comments
Hi Leuba, I have added another spotting showing this species displaying it's warning colors. 4th photo in here http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/257...
Thanks, Leuba.
I will try to get it to do that next time :-)
Another fascinating spotting, Chun. Must be great to see it in action warning-off predators !