Titan - the longest stick insect in Australia

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Titan - the longest stick insect in Australia

by Micah
(Sydney, NSW, Australia)

Titan- the longest stick insect in Australia

On the 7th of December, while we were playing outside, Ben found a stick insect on our front fence. The stick insect eats at night and is very still in the daytime. It is camouflaged really well by hanging upside down very still so no one sees it. It eats eucalyptus leaves and bottle brush leaves. We thought it may have come down from the top of the bottle brush tree to lay eggs.

One day we brought some bottle brush leaves into our terrarium where we keep the Titan, so that the Titan could eat some leaves. There was a baby stick insect in those leaves and we kept him with the big Titan.

After a few days, we didn't know where the baby one was.
Then we read that sometimes the female eats the males and we think that she is a female and that she probably ate the small stick insect.

Our Titan is about 24-25cm long from his head to the tip of his tail. She is the longest stick insect in Australia. Her Latin name is: Acrophylla titan, female, subfamily Phasmatinae.

Here's another photo of her:

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Titan - the longest stick insect in Australia

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Jan 09, 2008
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Not the Titan, but ctenomorpha chronus!
by: Marianne

This stick insect is not a Titan after all.

We have had her identified by an entomologist and the correct name for this stick insect is ctenomorpha chronus.

It is quite common in heath and woodland habitats from central New South Wales south to Victoria.

Dec 20, 2007
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Still being Identified
by: Marianne

Well, although the title says it is the Titan, we are actually wrong. There are a few reasons why it isn't the Titan. The cerci at the bottom of its body is far longer (10mm) than the Titans. The Titan has raised dots on its thorax and grey and pink mottled spots on their bodies, legs and wings.
Our stick insect wasn't like this, but we thought it was immature. However, this week we went to the Australian Museum in Sydney with our stick insect. We found out that she was fully grown (she has her wings) and she didn't fit the Titan's description.
We left her there for further identification. At this stage, we do not know what kind she is. Unfortunately, she died while in our care.