Insects

[Pootle]

How high can insects fly, which insect flies the highest and how high would this be in relative human terms?

[Catso]

I dunno your answer, but I will add I was watching some swifts one semi-cloudy day, flying very high, and I'm sure I saw them flying into the bottom wisps of clouds. So the insects must have been up there.

[Clanad]

An indepth study conducted a few years ago found that the millions of Mexican freetailed bats in south central Texas were feeding on a particular species of moth. Tracked by Doppler radar it was determined that the bats were catching the moths at nearly 4,000 feet. This assumes that altitude was above ground level. It appears the ground level is about 1,000 feet above sea level making the insect feeding bat's altitude around 5,000 feet above sea level.
As a commercial pilot I've had insect strikes on the windscreen at altitudes above 20,000 feet above sea level, but, as I recall, these were always in the vicinity of well developed thunderstorms and one has to assume that they were inadvertently carried to that altitude by strong updrafts. I have no way of knowing what kind of insects they were, except they made a large yellowish splat...

[WendyS]

Am not sure of actual height but the other day a small private aircraft flew over our house, and around the same height swifts and swallows seemed to be flying around in the sky catching insects so I guess an inaccurate answer would be "pretty high" in human terms.