Largest taxonomic order of insects

The largest taxonomic order of insects is Coleoptera, containing the beetles, and including approximately 40% of all living insect species currently known to science, as well as 25% of all known living animal species. Approximately 1 million insect species have been formally described to date (but with estimates on record of at least an additional 4.5 million species still awaiting formal discovery and description). In short, roughly 400,000 beetle species are presently recognized and named, with many new species joining their ranks each year. Beetles are of almost global distribution, absent only from Antarctica, northern polar regions and marine habitats.

The unparalleled abundance of beetles, in terms of both number of species and number of individual specimens, is such that it has frequently been remarked upon by naturalists down through the ages. But perhaps the best-known and most quoted of all such remarks relating to this subject is one that was made by 20^th-century British geneticist and evolutionary biologist J B S Haldane. When asked by some theologians what could be inferred about the mind of the Creator from the works of His Creation, Haldane drily replied: "An inordinate fondness for beetles"!