Antarctic midge
The Antarctic midge is a tiny fly with no wings that lives in Antarctica, the icy land at the bottom of the world. It is the only insect that can live there all year round. Even though it is just a few millimetres long, it is the biggest animal that lives only on land there.
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Fun facts
Having no wings may help it, because the strong Antarctic wind cannot blow it away.
It hides just under the ground, where it stays around 0 degrees even when the air is much colder.
It actually needs the cold. At 10 degrees, which is cool to us, its larvae die within a week.
It can lose up to 70 percent of the water in its body and still survive.
Its life takes two years, but the grown-up midge lives no more than 10 days.
Most asked questions about Antarctic midge
?Are there insects in Antarctica?
Yes, a few. The Antarctic midge is the only insect that lives there all year round.
?How does the Antarctic midge survive the cold?
It hides in the ground and fills its body with special sugars that stop too much ice from forming inside it.
?How big is the Antarctic midge?
Only 2 to 6 millimetres long, but that makes it the biggest land animal living only in Antarctica.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Belgica antarctica
- Named by
- Jacobs, 1900
- Group
- Flies and mosquitoes
- Family
- Chironomidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Diptera > Chironomidae
- Lives on
- Antarctica
Where the facts come from
- Belgica antarctica (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Tasteofcrayons. Public domain, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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