Ferocious looking, Orthopteran i.d. requested

[trehopr1]

About 10 years ago a collector friend and I had a chance to spend an afternoon looking over a collection owned by his friend. This fellow had a nice collection of various material collected largely by himself from several places overseas. This man was a teacher and he would spend 1 year away (here and there) on contract. One of the places he stayed was Australia and in his down time he would take up the net and set out to find things for his collection back home.

As we looked thru the collection we came across his Australian holdings. Below, is a photo of one drawer which really intrigued me.

In it you will see 2 large ferocious looking Orthopterans which are black with large jaws. I think they are some kind of rare "cricket" beastie which he said is seldom encountered.

Can anyone clarify what species they are as well as any background info. about them?



They are a pair and they are the only ones he encountered in a year of living there...

[trehopr1]

Here is a close-up photo I took of the male specimen.

Any ideas?



These creatures looked absolutely beastly.

[francisento]

This is a pair of "Australian King Cricket", Anostostoma australasiae (or possibly a different subspecie, there are 4-5).

They inhabit damp forests on the east coast such as in Queensland and New South Wales and belong to the family of Stenopelmatoidea.

Major Males have huge mandibles when they are adult, and females can reach sizes up to 80mm.

They come out on warm rainy nights and stories tell they hunt Funnel Web Spiders, but I don't know if that is true. Anyway, it is not 
clearly known why they have these huge mandibles, if it is for hunting and killing pray such as snails etc., or if maybe for rival fights.

Impressive crickets and amongst the "holy grail" for Orthoptera Collectors  - highly searched for by Japanese Collectors

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[trehopr1]

Fascinating information and write up francisento about these most unusual beasts. Thank you for your expertise !