My boss was holidaying near Mt Martha and his daughter was kind enough to bring me this beautiful female King Cricket , it is only the 2nd one I've seen in Australia . Growing up in NZ naturally i ran into then all the time , we burn a lot of Manuka (Tea Tree) and it is a favorite home for the Weta( kiwi speak) . As we commonly stacked fire wood in our back porches where our gum boots lived it was not uncommon for a kid to turn up to primary school with a bandage on the big toe from the bite of a weta that thought a gum boot might be a nice dark place to hide .Many found their way into houses either in the wood or wandering around from the wood looking for a new home (photos 1 - 5)
I've also included 3 photos of the NZ Wetas , they are a lot bigger than the Victorian King Cricket's , more like the Queensland rainforest ones , the 3rd NZ photo is a NZ Giant Weta , they are huge , i never saw one in the flesh and they are protected by Fisheries in NZ . These insects all vary depending where they are , the Australian ones differ from the NZ ones and the South African ones are different again .