5 Monster-Sized Versions of Bugs That Will Haunt Your Dreams

5 Grubs

This hulking dinosaur maggot is the grub of the Hercules beetle, which can be found squirming in and around piles of rotting wood down in Central and South America. It can grow up to 4-and-a-half inches long, leaving it sufficient room in its abdomen to digest your nightmares.

Even in its larval state, Hercules beetles wield sizable jaws and can remain in this form for up to two years, making them a perfect starter pet for toddlers, if your parenting skills are the living personification of a Vincent Price character. They're so reclusive that they usually require an ultraviolet light to even locate, should you be the type of person who requires this piece of information.

4 Beetles

The Hercules beetle (what that grub in the previous entry eventually becomes) can reach 7 inches in length, mostly thanks to the massive horn-like protuberance on their face, which they use to ram the hell out of each other. It's one of the largest beetles in the world, and we say "one of" because Earth contains even more beetles that look like they should be terrorizing Brendan Fraser inside a haunted pyramid:

The serrated mouth scythes of the long-horn beetle (left) of the Amazon basin give him the countenance of a spitting terror demon, and the Goliath beetle looks so absurdly horrible that we initially thought it was a puppet people use to scare children into cleaning their rooms. But the undisputed champ is the Titan beetle, which can grow bigger than some breeds of dog and are able to easily snap a pencil in half with their mandibles.

3 Stick Bugs

Chan's Megastick is native to Borneo and is easily the longest bug on record, measuring 22 inches, despite the fact that no insect needs to be 2 feet long for any reason.

The bug is named for amateur Malaysian naturalist Datuk Chan, who boldly seized the opportunity to christen it with a euphemism for his own massive dong.

2 Katydids

Giant Malaysian Katydids are 6 inches long and are some of the loudest insects in existence, which they make up for by looking like a grasshopper from a Disney cartoon. They also have the largest testes, proportionately, of any creature on the planet, which means that Malaysia will not find itself lacking in giant Katydids at any point in the foreseeable future.

1 Spiders

Of course. Of course this list was going to have goddamned spiders on it.

The giant huntsman is the largest spider that has yet revealed itself to the human race, though it is probably smaller than the legions of eight-legged beasts that we remain blessedly unaware of.

This foot-long fear harvester typically makes its home in caves, as befits all things hoary and unspeakable. Since the species was only recently discovered (in a dank Laotian pit in 2001), there are still questions as to its exact diet, but we assume it feasts on fugitive souls from Hell.

In case you were relieved to discover that the huntsman lives in hollow stone burrows in the Earth and not in mailboxes along Bleeker Street, here are some pictures of the mammothian superbeast showing up inside people's fucking houses:

You're welcome.