The average life span of the earwigs, regardless of gender, is about a year, which is quite a lot for insects. and today official entomology confirms that all known types of earwigs are approximately the same size – from 1 to 3 cm, depending on the stage of the sexual cycle and the species. There are slightly larger specimens, but their length does not exceed the standard by 1-1.5 cm.
It is not a single extinct species today, it is an ordinary earwig, but its dimensions were associated with such a notion as island gigantism. The first such a large specimen was found in 1798 on the island of St. Helena, which, by the way, was expelled by Napoleon. On that small land area there were no natural enemies of earwigs, which allowed them to grow to such a limit.
However, later, as far as human activity was concerned, such predators were brought in, and the earwig there became quite standard. The last mention of the giant earwig is dated to the middle of the last century. Since then, even specially equipped expeditions have not found a single large specimen. But this does not mean that they are not there, like Gulliver, to whom such a earwig can crawl into the ear.
