Galapagos Species Database
The Galapagos Species Database shares the information about the species from our Natural History Collections.
Chelicerca galapagensis
embiopteros
Arid to humid forest zones; February-July. Feeding on lichens, or detritus. The silk galleries may occur on bushes and tree trunks, on lichen covered rocks, and in sea bird rookeries. Ross (1966) suggests that the ancestors dispersed to the islands in the plumage of birds. It is closely related to species of costal arid Ecuador and Peru.
Domain
Eukaryota
Kingdom
Animalia
Phylum
Arthropoda
Class
Insecta
Order
Embioptera
Family
Anisembiidae
Genus
Chelicerca
Species
galapagensis
Taxon category: Accepted
Origin: Endemic
Map of specimen collection localities or observation records for this species in our collections database.
- Linsley, E.G. (1977) Insects of the Galápagos (Supplement). Occassional Papers of the Califoria Academy of Sciences 125: 1-50.
- Peck, S.B. (1996) Diversity and distribution of the orthopteroid insects of the Galápagos Islands, Ecuador. Canadian Journal of Zoology 74: 1497-1510.
- Peck, S.B. (2001) Smaller Orders of Insects of the Galápagos Islands, Ecuador: Evolution, Ecology, and Diversity. NRC Research Press, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, 278 pp.
- Ross, E.S. (1966) A new species of Embioptera from the Galápagos Islands. Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences Fourth Series 34(12): 499-504.
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This page should be cited as follows:
"Galapagos Species Database, Chelicerca galapagensis", dataZone. Charles Darwin Foundation, https://datazone.darwinfoundation.org/en/checklist/?species=10701. Accessed 5 November 2026.