Other Invertebrate

All insects are invertebrates. But not all invertebrates are insects! Invertebrates are very diverse group of animals which means they have lots of different and unique features. The obvious thing that makes them different from vertebrates is that they don’t have a backbone nor any bones at all! They may have an external skeleton, shell or no such thing at all.  

Because the lack of a bony skeleton is the only feature that invertebrates have in common, when looking for which invertebrates are not insects, look to see if they have the following features:

• A hard exoskeleton
• 6 legs
• 3 body parts: head, thorax and abdomen
• A pair of antennae
• ‘Compound eyes’. This means each eye is made up of lots of tiny units with each acting like a little eye.

If the invertebrate has all of these features, its an insect. If it doesn’t select this ‘other invertebrate’ option.