Story By: Ana Lacasa, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Newsflash

This is the huge mystery bug a homeowner has found in her garden which is almost the size of her hand.

The startling discovery was made by Stacy Castillo at her family home in the city of Cabimas, in the northwestern Venezuelan state of Zulia where she is spending the country’s coronavirus lockdown.

The images show the huge flying insect dead on the ground, with the creature measuring almost the length of Castillo’s hand.

The homeowner told Newsflash: “I have never seen an insect like this, that is why I was shocked.”

Despite some reports claiming that she had killed the insect, Castillo told Newsflash she had found it dead, adding: “I would have not had the courage to kill it.”

She said she left it in her garden “so that the woman working in the house could clean it up” but said she did not call the authorities as this “would do nothing for the situation of the country.”

The images were widely shared on social media, receiving more than 64,100 likes and 14,500 comments.

Professor of the Agronomic Faculty of the Central University of Venezuela, Jose Clavijo, said that the insect might be a species of Tropidacris collaris, which is a species of grasshopper sometimes known as the blue-winged grasshopper in the family Romaleidae, which feeds on a variety of plants.

Clavijo said: “It can damage crops but it does not cause health problems in human beings.”

Netizens compared the insect to the evil locusts from the Disney film ‘A Bug’s Life’, with ‘Luisbermudz91’ commenting: “How don’t you know it? Look at it, it has appeared in films.”

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