187
Knid's insects
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You raise your hand and ask "Aren't hedgehogs better than insects? They eat insects don't they."

"What an awful little squeaker you are! Hedgehogs! Pah! No boy, hedgehogs are not better than insects.

"Firstly: hedgehogs can't fly but insects can. Insects have been flying for over 350 million years! And to think we are always so impressed by the birds. Look at me, look at my feathers, I'm a bird! But insects have been flying for twice as long as birds - birds only evolved 150 million years ago. Pathetic.

"Secondly: a hedgehog may eat an insect, but after a hedgehog dies who has the last laugh? Insects that's who. Insects, working together will devour the hedgehog carcass until nothing is left, not even the bones. If it wasn't for insects we would have dead hedgehogs all over the place - you would be tripping over them every time you went out of your front door!

"Thirdly: how many hedgehogs are there in the world? Not many I can tell you. Or how many mammals even? All the hedgehogs, deer, humans, rabbits and elephants put together?

Mammals make up only 0.4% of all animal species.

Insects species make up 70% of all animal species, and if we include all arthropods that's over 80%. That means for every one mammal species (like a hedgehog) there are more than 170 insect species.

"No, it is clear to me, as it should now be clear to you, that hedgehogs are pitiful, almost inconsequential creatures compared to insects and arthropods."

"But sir," interrupts Kensley, "insects are disgusting..."

"Oh the cheek of it! Who is to say that you are not a disgusting young lady with your.... goggly eyes and grubby fingers? There will come a day - and maybe sooner than you think - when everyone will appreciate the magnificence of an insect, when people don't shudder when I brush past them with my cloak. Yes you will appreciate those 'disgusting' insects soon enough my girl."

Professor Jape paused and pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers. "Class dismissed. Your homework is to write an essay with the title 'What I love most about insects and arthropods'. Two thousand words minimum."