Madagascan Giant Water Bug - mug shot

Note: not happy with this image as the specimen had some moldy spots. Still sharing it for the interesting view on the needle-like rostrum. I first thought the specimen was damaged and its mouth parts broken. It turns out it really looks like this also in live subjects:
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/proxy/V8ji9OfM1dSzrR9YMf4LWOiPkZauCSAVoX5amyS0M4xPNtUZ3Zi1OMjt7Ci2bmhM1LDteGDx_HSB3AvNtkjN1f_Kh8VAubbf5rJHoJEonfUk

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Specimen. Even when dead I was intimidated by it and glad to have this one out of the way. At 8cm, it's a massive insect. Species in this genus are known to be some of the largest True Bugs (hemiptera) in the world. They've earned the nickname "Toe biter" for their extremely painful sting.

Besides overall size being impressive, another noteworthy feature are their massively thick legs. It seems an extremely strong insect, a fast swimmer but also one able to latch on and hold onto large struggling prey such as snails, frogs, tadpoles and small fish. Its front legs are raptorial, whilst the hind legs are optimized for floating as well as swimming. They can even fan out extra hair to get more grip on the water when chasing prey.

Once within its grip, the bug will pierce the prey with a needle-like rostrum and inject toxic enzymes.

They can even fly, which is usually done at night, where they often get disoriented by light.