DAILY NO. 23 · VERIFIED MEASUREMENTS
The five insects & bugs objects from the Size It Up puzzle on September 23, 2026, with the measured size of each, the reference it was compared against, a source you can check, and how the community's guesses landed. Want the surprise first? Replay this puzzle — archived days never touch your streak.
Answer: a giant wētā measures 10 cm (length / span), which is almost exactly the same size as the reference, a monarch butterfly at 10 cm.
One of the heaviest insects on Earth — a large female outweighs a sparrow.
Common miss: players tend to inflate a giant wētā when it sits beside a monarch butterfly — big things get squeezed, small familiar things get stretched.
Answer: a large dragonfly measures 12 cm (length / span), which is about 1.3× smaller than the reference, a hard-shell taco at 15 cm.
Dragonflies catch their prey on over ninety per cent of attempts, the best hit rate of any predator.
Common miss: players tend to inflate a large dragonfly when it sits beside a hard-shell taco — big things get squeezed, small familiar things get stretched.
Answer: a monarch butterfly measures 10 cm (length / span), which is 1.3× as big as the reference, an apple at 8 cm.
Monarchs migrate as far as 4,000 km on a 10 cm wingspan.
Common miss: players tend to compress a monarch butterfly when it sits beside an apple — big things get squeezed, small familiar things get stretched.
Answer: a mosquito measures 1.5 cm (length / span), which is 1.2× as big as the reference, a leafcutter ant at 1.3 cm.
Only the females bite; the whine is the wingbeat, hundreds of times a second.
Common miss: players tend to compress a mosquito when it sits beside a leafcutter ant — big things get squeezed, small familiar things get stretched.
Answer: a praying mantis measures 10 cm (length / span), which is almost exactly the same size as the reference, a hamburger at 10 cm.
A mantis can turn its head almost all the way round, which few insects manage.
Common miss: players tend to inflate a praying mantis when it sits beside a hamburger — big things get squeezed, small familiar things get stretched.
Sizes are measured along the axis named in each round and link to their published source. Explore the full library by category, or read how scoring works.