Adults commonly have a body length around 15–25 mm with much longer legs.
Fine-art photographic collection
Tipula paludosa
A short-lived crane fly that emerges with hundreds of mature eggs and lays almost all of them within a single day.
About this species
European Crane Fly
Tipula paludosaMeigen, 1830
Information reviewed15 July 2026
Tipula paludosa is a European crane fly introduced to parts of North America. Its tough-skinned larvae, known as leatherjackets, live in soil and feed on roots and plant crowns, while the adult stage is brief and devoted mainly to reproduction.
Taxonomy
Animalia · Arthropoda · Insecta · Diptera · Tipulidae · Tipula
Accepted taxon. · checked 2026-07-15
Europe, with introduced populations in North AmericaBroad range and selected reference localities — not a complete occurrence map.
Europe, with introduced populations in North America
Grassland, lawns, pasture, gardens and other moist soils.
Adults emerge in late summer or autumn; larvae feed in and near the soil surface, often at night.
Larvae feed on roots, shoots and decaying plant matter; adults feed little or not at all.
Solitary.
What makes this species remarkable?
A newly emerged female already carries hundreds of mature eggs and may lay about half within eight hours and roughly 95 percent within twenty-six hours.
One western North American study recorded a mean of about 338 eggs per female, compressed into an adult life focused almost entirely on mating and laying.
The leatherjacket larva survives underground behind a tough flexible skin and can emerge at night to cut grass shoots at the soil surface.
More photographs
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