Like, say they have a lifespan of a week. If they die out in winter because of lack of food or cold temperatures, how come we see them again in the spring? Where do they come from?
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It varies but all insects (and many other invertebrates) have lifecycles egg > larvae > pupae > adult.
Some insects can live a long time in their adult state. Tropical beetles aren’t bothered by the weather for instance and can live for years. Ants, bees and other social insects have workers that live for months or years, sheltered inside the colony.
Longer lived insects often find shelter inside wood, under leaves, underground etc. to escape the frost as they hibernate for spring.
But for many other insects, the adult stage only lives for a few days or weeks as it is only intended to find a mate and reproduce before dying. Junebugs, for instance, only live a few weeks to reproduce but their larvae sometimes spend as much as 11 years underground eating roots to gather the energy for their final transformation into a reproducing adult.
For these species, the adults generally come out during spring or summer and don’t need to survive winter. Their eggs and larvae will do that in sheltered spots.
For some species, the adult is only intended to live such a short time that it doesn’t even have a functioning mouth, it gets all the energy it needs from the stored energy reserves the larvae collects before transformation.
Others, like butterflies, spend a while feeding and looking for a mate while they collect the energy they need to produce eggs.
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