Feast Your Eyes on a Bug Big Enough to Eat a Carrot [PHOTOS]

Just try not to get the creeps looking at what has now been declared the largest insect ever found.

Etymologist and explorer Mark Moffett discovered the cricket-like insect on Little Barrier Island, in New Zealand. The Cook Strait Giant Weta has a wingspan of seven inches, weighs 71 grams and is big enough to eat a carrot. Did it just get chilly in here, or are we shivering in fear?

Thankfully for the survival of carrots and mankind as we know it, the Weta can only be found on the Island where Moffett stumbled upon it after two days of searching. (For now at least.) The species was wiped off the mainland of New Zealand when Europeans accidentally introduced rats into the environment there. Rats versus giant bugs? Can you say "the next hit video game franchise"?

Get another look at the monster bug in the photo below.

[via Telegraph]