Wētā
informal group of insects
Wētā (also spelled weta in English) is the common name for a group of about 100 insect species in the families Anostostomatidae and Rhaphidophoridae endemic to New Zealand. They are giant flightless crickets, and some are among the heaviest insects in the world. Generally nocturnal, most small species are carnivores and scavengers while the larger species are herbivorous. Although some endemic birds (and tuatara) likely prey on them, wētā are disproportionately preyed upon by introduced mammals, and some species are now critically endangered.
Name
Wētā is a loanword, from the Māori-language word wētā, which refers to this whole group of large insects; some types of wētā have a specific Māori name. In New Zealand English, it is spelled either "weta" or "wētā". The form with macrons is increasingly common in formal writing, as the Māori word weta (without macrons) instead means "excrement". Words of Māori origin in New Zealand English are both singular and plural.
General characteristics
Many wētā are large by insect standards and some species are among the largest and heaviest in the world. Their physical appearance is like a katydid, long-horned grasshopper, or cricket, but the hind legs are enlarged and usually very spiny.
The public source identifies “Wētā” as informal group of insects. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Wētā, informal and group.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 2, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1065917. The Library of Congress control number is sh2002005771. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Wētā” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.