New Zealand Invertebrates

11005-27403 Elegant cave weta (Pleioplectron rodmorrisi) male. A strikingly beautiful and unmistakeable alpine cave weta with vey long legs. First photographed by Rod in December 1993, on bluffs above the Kahutara Saddle, he had previously seen the same undescribed species at night on bluffs in the headbasin in the Kowhai Stream Nature Reserve - in January of that same year. It was named in 2019, and is now known to inhabit rock bluffs in the sub-alpine and low alpine regions of the Kaikōura Ranges and North Canterbury, up to an elevation of approximately 1500 m. Kahutara Saddle *

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11005-27403 Elegant cave weta (Pleioplectron rodmorrisi) male. A strikingly beautiful and unmistakeable alpine cave weta with vey long legs. First photographed by Rod in December 1993, on bluffs above the Kahutara Saddle, he had previously seen the same undescribed species at night on bluffs in the headbasin in the Kowhai Stream Nature Reserve - in January of that same year. It was named in 2019, and is now known to inhabit rock bluffs in the sub-alpine and low alpine regions of the Kaikōura Ranges and North Canterbury, up to an elevation of approximately 1500 m. Kahutara Saddle *

27403 Cave weta mountain bluff Pleioplectron rodmorrisi North Canterbury alpine subalpine new species discovered male beautiful marked cave weta rock bluffs head Kowhai Stream Nature Reserve Mt Skedaddle Organ Range Hanmer Springs Kahutara Saddle Seaward Kaikouras