European Earwig: a two-minute wildlife lesson

Beetles and Friends · day 6 of 7

Five facts

1. Its name comes from its back wings: unfolded, they look like human ears. Its Latin name, auricularia, points to the same thing.
2. Males and females both carry pincers at the tip of the body. A male's are big and curved, while a female's are straight.
3. It has good wings but hardly ever flies. Instead it hitches rides on clothes, plants, wood and even bundles of newspapers.
4. A mother lays about 50 eggs in an underground nest and stays with them, cleaning each one with her mouth to keep mould away.
5. An earwig mother can tell her own eggs from others by their family scent, yet she cares for foreign eggs just as well.

The quiz

1. What gave the earwig its name?

• Its hind wings look like human ears (correct)
• It lives inside ears
• It has huge ears
• It hears very well

Unfolded, its hind wings look like human ears.

2. How are a male earwig's pincers different from a female's?

• Only females have pincers
• They are big and curved (correct)
• They are much shorter
• They are hidden under the wings

Males have large, curved pincers; females have straight ones.

3. How does the European earwig mostly travel to new places?

• By flying long distances
• By swimming
• By riding on clothes and goods (correct)
• By rolling in the wind

It rarely flies and is carried around on clothing and products.

4. Why does an earwig mother keep cleaning her eggs?

• To make them hatch faster
• To change their colour
• To make them smaller
• To keep mould and germs away (correct)

Cleaning removes fungal spores and germs.

5. What does an earwig mother do with eggs that are not her own?

• She pushes them out of the nest
• She cares for them like her own (correct)
• She eats them
• She ignores them

She grooms and defends foreign eggs just like her own.

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