Above: A 152mm Titanus beside some Australian prionids. Top to bottom: Paroplites australis; Toxeutes arcuatus; Agrianome
spinicollis; and Xixuthrus microcerus. Note the ovipositor protruding from the tip of the abdomen on the female P. australis.
Photograph by David Maynard.
Left: I first contracted Titanus fever when I saw the classic image on the left in the May, 1959, edition of The National Geo-
graphic Magazine, shortly after the 'hand' photo appeared in V. J. Stanek’s ‘The Pictorial Encyclopedia of Insects’, published in
1969. The giant larva was later found not to be that of a Titanus, but of the closely related and also giant Macrodontia
cervicornis. Photograph by Simon Fearn.