Insects Quiz
Beetles, bees, monarchs and 17 year cicadas: 15 questions on the small creatures that run the planet.
Which of these creatures is NOT an insect?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Spider
Spiders are arachnids, with eight legs and two main body sections, whereas insects have six legs and three body sections. Scorpions, ticks and mites are arachnids too.
Centipedes and millipedes are not insects either; they belong to a separate group of arthropods called myriapods.
How many main body sections does an insect have?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Three
An insect's body is divided into the head, which carries the eyes and antennae, the thorax, which bears the six legs and any wings, and the abdomen, which holds most of the digestive and reproductive organs.
The word insect comes from the Latin insectum, meaning cut into sections, a reference to this segmented body plan.
What is the hard cased pupal stage of a butterfly called, from which the adult eventually emerges?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Chrysalis
A butterfly caterpillar hardens into a chrysalis, inside which its body is broken down and rebuilt as a winged adult. Moths usually spin a silk cocoon around their pupa instead.
Inside the chrysalis, a few clusters of cells called imaginal discs survive the breakdown and grow into the wings, legs and antennae.
Which insect causes more human deaths than any other animal, mainly by spreading malaria and dengue?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Mosquito
Mosquitoes transmit malaria, dengue, yellow fever, Zika and other diseases that together kill several hundred thousand people a year. Malaria alone caused around 600,000 deaths in 2023.
Only female mosquitoes bite, because they need the protein in blood to develop their eggs; males feed on nectar.
The silk used in fabrics is unwound from the cocoon of which insect?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Silkworm moth
Silk comes from the cocoon of Bombyx mori, the domesticated silkworm moth. Each cocoon is a single thread up to 900 m (3,000 ft) long, unwound after the pupa is killed with heat.
Silkworms were domesticated in China around 5,000 years ago and are now so dependent on humans that the adult moths cannot fly.
In a honeybee colony, which bees are the males?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Drones
Drones are male honeybees that develop from unfertilised eggs. Their only role is to mate with a queen, and they are usually expelled from the hive to die before winter.
A drone that succeeds in mating dies immediately afterwards, because its reproductive organs are torn away in the act.
Monarch butterflies from eastern North America spend the winter clustered in mountain forests of which country?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Mexico
Each autumn millions of monarchs fly up to 4,800 km (3,000 miles) to a few patches of oyamel fir forest in the mountains of Michoacan and the State of Mexico, where they cluster on the trees until spring.
No single butterfly makes the round trip: the return north takes three or four generations, yet the great grandchildren find the same forests.
Which group of insects forms the largest order in the animal kingdom, with around 400,000 described species?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Beetles
Beetles, the order Coleoptera, make up about 25 percent of all described animal species, and new ones are still being named every year. Their hardened front wings act as protective cases.
Asked what his studies revealed about the Creator, the biologist J. B. S. Haldane reportedly replied that He had an inordinate fondness for beetles.
Which insect is famous for an adult life so brief that it often lasts only a day or less?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Mayfly
Adult mayflies have no working mouthparts and exist only to mate. Some species live just a few hours, although their aquatic nymphs may have spent a year or two growing underwater first.
Mayfly hatches can be so dense that they show up on weather radar and have forced bridges to close because the piled up bodies made the road slippery.
Insect exoskeletons are made mainly of which tough natural material?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Chitin
An insect's exoskeleton is built from chitin, a long chain sugar molecule, combined with proteins. It is light and strong but cannot grow, so insects must moult to get bigger.
Chitin also forms the cell walls of fungi and the shells of crabs and shrimps, and is being developed into biodegradable plastics.
Periodical cicadas in the eastern United States emerge in huge numbers after how many years underground?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
13 or 17
Periodical cicadas of the genus Magicicada spend 13 or 17 years underground feeding on root sap, then emerge together by the billion. Different broods are on different schedules across the eastern US.
Both 13 and 17 are prime numbers, which may help the cicadas avoid falling into step with the life cycles of predators.
Which insect was sacred to the ancient Egyptians, who linked it to the sun god rolling the sun across the sky?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Scarab beetle
The Egyptians watched dung beetles roll balls of dung and saw a symbol of Khepri, the god who pushed the sun across the sky each morning. Scarab amulets were placed over the hearts of mummies.
Dung beetles are the only insects known to navigate by the Milky Way, using the band of light to roll their balls in a straight line.
Leafcutter ants carry pieces of leaves back to their nests. What do they do with them?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Grow a fungus on them to eat
Leafcutter ants cannot digest leaves. They chew them into a mulch on which they cultivate a fungus, and the fungus is the colony's food. The ants weed the garden and feed it like farmers.
A mature leafcutter colony can hold several million ants and strip as much vegetation as a cow in a day.
Fireflies produce their glow through a chemical reaction driven by which enzyme?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Luciferase
Firefly light is produced when the enzyme luciferase causes the molecule luciferin to react with oxygen, releasing almost all the energy as light and virtually none as heat.
Luciferase is now a standard tool in laboratories, where it is used to make cells glow so that researchers can track genes and diseases.
Which scientist won a Nobel Prize in 1973 for decoding the honeybee waggle dance?
Got a hunch? Pick the answer that feels right.
Karl von Frisch
Karl von Frisch showed that a returning forager's waggle dance tells hive mates the direction and distance of food, with the angle of the waggle run relative to vertical encoding the angle to the sun.
He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen, the only time it has gone to animal behaviour researchers.
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All Science quizzes →About the Insects Quiz
Beetles alone account for roughly 400,000 described species, about a quarter of all known animals, and mosquitoes kill more people each year than any other creature on Earth. Insects outnumber us, outlast us and quietly pollinate most of what we eat.
These 15 questions start with the basics of insect anatomy and the famous life cycles, then move into honeybee society, the monarch migration to Mexico, the chemistry behind firefly light and the Nobel Prize winning discovery of the waggle dance. It suits curious kids, gardeners, biology students and anyone who has ever wondered why cicadas appear only once in 17 years.
You will find 15 multiple choice questions here, each with four options. Difficulty: Medium. Most people finish in about 6 minutes, and every answer comes with a short explanation and one extra fact worth keeping.
How to play
Read the question and pick one of the four answers. The correct answer is revealed straight away with a short explanation, then press Next question to keep going. At the end you get your score out of 15 and a full review of your round. Play again any time and the questions arrive in a fresh order. There is no timer and no account.
Good to know before you play
How many legs does an insect have?
All adult insects have six legs, attached to the middle body section called the thorax. Spiders, with eight legs and two body segments, are arachnids and not insects at all.
What is the biggest group of insects?
Beetles, the order Coleoptera, with around 400,000 described species. Roughly one in every four known animal species on Earth is a beetle.
Which insect is the most dangerous to humans?
The mosquito. Diseases it spreads, above all malaria, kill hundreds of thousands of people every year, far more than snakes, sharks or any large predator.
Answer key: all 15 questions with explanations
- Which of these creatures is NOT an insect?
Spider Spiders are arachnids, with eight legs and two main body sections, whereas insects have six legs and three body sections. Scorpions, ticks and mites are arachnids too. Centipedes and millipedes are not insects either; they belong to a separate group of arthropods called myriapods. - How many main body sections does an insect have?
Three An insect's body is divided into the head, which carries the eyes and antennae, the thorax, which bears the six legs and any wings, and the abdomen, which holds most of the digestive and reproductive organs. The word insect comes from the Latin insectum, meaning cut into sections, a reference to this segmented body plan. - What is the hard cased pupal stage of a butterfly called, from which the adult eventually emerges?
Chrysalis A butterfly caterpillar hardens into a chrysalis, inside which its body is broken down and rebuilt as a winged adult. Moths usually spin a silk cocoon around their pupa instead. Inside the chrysalis, a few clusters of cells called imaginal discs survive the breakdown and grow into the wings, legs and antennae. - Which insect causes more human deaths than any other animal, mainly by spreading malaria and dengue?
Mosquito Mosquitoes transmit malaria, dengue, yellow fever, Zika and other diseases that together kill several hundred thousand people a year. Malaria alone caused around 600,000 deaths in 2023. Only female mosquitoes bite, because they need the protein in blood to develop their eggs; males feed on nectar. - The silk used in fabrics is unwound from the cocoon of which insect?
Silkworm moth Silk comes from the cocoon of Bombyx mori, the domesticated silkworm moth. Each cocoon is a single thread up to 900 m (3,000 ft) long, unwound after the pupa is killed with heat. Silkworms were domesticated in China around 5,000 years ago and are now so dependent on humans that the adult moths cannot fly. - In a honeybee colony, which bees are the males?
Drones Drones are male honeybees that develop from unfertilised eggs. Their only role is to mate with a queen, and they are usually expelled from the hive to die before winter. A drone that succeeds in mating dies immediately afterwards, because its reproductive organs are torn away in the act. - Monarch butterflies from eastern North America spend the winter clustered in mountain forests of which country?
Mexico Each autumn millions of monarchs fly up to 4,800 km (3,000 miles) to a few patches of oyamel fir forest in the mountains of Michoacan and the State of Mexico, where they cluster on the trees until spring. No single butterfly makes the round trip: the return north takes three or four generations, yet the great grandchildren find the same forests. - Which group of insects forms the largest order in the animal kingdom, with around 400,000 described species?
Beetles Beetles, the order Coleoptera, make up about 25 percent of all described animal species, and new ones are still being named every year. Their hardened front wings act as protective cases. Asked what his studies revealed about the Creator, the biologist J. B. S. Haldane reportedly replied that He had an inordinate fondness for beetles. - Which insect is famous for an adult life so brief that it often lasts only a day or less?
Mayfly Adult mayflies have no working mouthparts and exist only to mate. Some species live just a few hours, although their aquatic nymphs may have spent a year or two growing underwater first. Mayfly hatches can be so dense that they show up on weather radar and have forced bridges to close because the piled up bodies made the road slippery. - Insect exoskeletons are made mainly of which tough natural material?
Chitin An insect's exoskeleton is built from chitin, a long chain sugar molecule, combined with proteins. It is light and strong but cannot grow, so insects must moult to get bigger. Chitin also forms the cell walls of fungi and the shells of crabs and shrimps, and is being developed into biodegradable plastics. - Periodical cicadas in the eastern United States emerge in huge numbers after how many years underground?
13 or 17 Periodical cicadas of the genus Magicicada spend 13 or 17 years underground feeding on root sap, then emerge together by the billion. Different broods are on different schedules across the eastern US. Both 13 and 17 are prime numbers, which may help the cicadas avoid falling into step with the life cycles of predators. - Which insect was sacred to the ancient Egyptians, who linked it to the sun god rolling the sun across the sky?
Scarab beetle The Egyptians watched dung beetles roll balls of dung and saw a symbol of Khepri, the god who pushed the sun across the sky each morning. Scarab amulets were placed over the hearts of mummies. Dung beetles are the only insects known to navigate by the Milky Way, using the band of light to roll their balls in a straight line. - Leafcutter ants carry pieces of leaves back to their nests. What do they do with them?
Grow a fungus on them to eat Leafcutter ants cannot digest leaves. They chew them into a mulch on which they cultivate a fungus, and the fungus is the colony's food. The ants weed the garden and feed it like farmers. A mature leafcutter colony can hold several million ants and strip as much vegetation as a cow in a day. - Fireflies produce their glow through a chemical reaction driven by which enzyme?
Luciferase Firefly light is produced when the enzyme luciferase causes the molecule luciferin to react with oxygen, releasing almost all the energy as light and virtually none as heat. Luciferase is now a standard tool in laboratories, where it is used to make cells glow so that researchers can track genes and diseases. - Which scientist won a Nobel Prize in 1973 for decoding the honeybee waggle dance?
Karl von Frisch Karl von Frisch showed that a returning forager's waggle dance tells hive mates the direction and distance of food, with the angle of the waggle run relative to vertical encoding the angle to the sun. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Konrad Lorenz and Niko Tinbergen, the only time it has gone to animal behaviour researchers.
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