Peter Larsen, age 9, of San Luis Obispo, Calif., for his question:
HOW MANY KINDS OF INSECTS ARE THERE?
Science has described and named about one million kinds of animals. Of these, more than 800,000 are classified as insects. Scientists continue to discover from 7,000 to 10,000 new kinds of insects every year. They believe there may be between 1 million to 10 million kinds of insects still undiscovered.
You'll find insects living just about everywhere on earth. They are happy in steamy tropical jungles and cold polar regions. They live on high snow capped mountains or on hot deserts below sea level.
Only in the oceans are few insects found.
Insects smell chiefly with their antennae and some of them taste with their feet. Many hear by means of hairs on their bodies.
Insects have no voices but some make noise that can be hard a mile away. They have no lungs but instead breathe through holes in their sides.
Some insects have no eyes while others have five or more eyes.
Many insects have enormous strength. An ant, for example, can lift a weight 50 times as heavy as its body. If a 175 pound man could do as well, he could lift more than 4 tons and with his teeth, too.
A flea can broad jump about 13 inches. If a man could do as well, he could jump about 700 feet.
Scientists say that insects first appeared on earth at least 400 million years ago. Down through the ages, they have struggled endlessly to survive. During this struggle, insects have gradually developed an incredible variety of body forms and ways of life.
Also, insects have adapted themselves to almost all types of living conditions. They are often said to be man's only rivals for control of the earth.
Most insects are less than a quarter of an inch long. The smallest ones, including some beetles and fairy flies, are about one hundredth of an inch long and could very easily crawl through the eye of the world's smallest needle.
Giant insects include the Goliath bettle, which grows more than four inches long, and the Atlas moth, which has a wingspread of about 10 inches.
An Atlas moth is about 1,000 times as large as a fairy fly. Among mammals, the blue whale the largest of all animals is only about 500 times as large as a shrew.
Insects are often grouped as beneficial or harmful, but this grouping is somewhat artificial. All insects form part of the great web of life that includes man and all other living things.
Insects feed on plants and animals, but they also are food for plants and animals. Insects thus help keep in balance the total number of plants and animals on earth.
If all insects were to suddenly disappear, the earth would be completely changed. Man probably could not survive such a situation.