William Colenso's Giant Weta

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Deinacrida heteracantha is known by a number of names: wetapunga, giant weta, Little Barrier Island weta and demon grasshopper.

The giant weta is one of the most important insects in the museum’s collection – Not only is it the oldest New Zealand insect, it is the world's heaviest insect. A female giant weta bearing eggs weighed 71g - this is three times the weight of an average house mouse. She was 85mm long, not including her ovipositor. In the absence of mammals, wetas have evolved to fill the place in a forest ecosystem usually taken by mice and voles. They are living fossils, showing little or no change in body shape for millions of years. The name wetapunga is a Maori one. It translates as 'god of ugly things' or 'monsters of the night'.
A missionary by the name of William Colenso, caught this sepcimen in 1838. He thought it was a new species and wrote a paper that assigned the giant weta the scientific name Hemideina gigantea. What he didn’t know was that this species of weta had already been given a scientific name several years earlier so technically it has to be called by the name - Deinacrida heteracantha.