Insect Taxonomic Diversty By Kristen Vice Ephemeroptera Mayflies

Insect Taxonomic Diversty By: Kristen Vice

Ephemeroptera • Mayflies or shadflies are insects belonging to the order Ephemeroptera. • Mayflies are one of the most important herbiverous invertebrate aquatic insects. • Insects of moderate size with an incomplete metamorphosis. • immature stage is aquatic and the adult stage is very brief. • They do not feed and only live from 1 -2 hours to 14 days at most.

Odonata • Odonata is an order of carnivorous insects, encompassing dragonflies. • Dragonflies and damselflies are fairly large flying insects. • Very colorful and are carnivorous. • Odonates are in some ways beneficial as predators because they can be used to control pests.

Blattaria - Blattaria includes the roaches, from the 6 inch tropical roaches of South America. - 4, 000 species worldwide. - Most species are about the size of a thumbnail, but several species are bigger. - makes a chirping noise. - female cockroach lays between 10 and 90 eggs per time. - takes just a month for the baby cockroach to become an adult cockroach.

Isoptera • Termites are a group of eusocial insects that, until recently, were classified at the taxonomic rank of order Isoptera. • Termites mostly feed on dead plant material. • The nymphs of termites resemble adults. • 2 pairs of membranous wings of equal length. Wings are present in reproductive castes only and shed after mating.

Dermatptera - Earwigs are mostly dark coloured (brown to black) - 2 pairs of wings. The forewings are short and protectively hardened. - The name 'earwig' come from a European myth that these insects had a habit of crawling into human ears. - Female earwigs are able to store sperm for several months before fertilization.

Orthoptera • Orthoptera is an order of insects with paurometabolous or incomplete metamorphosis, including the grasshoppers, crickets, cave crickets, Jerusalem crickets, katydids, weta, lubber, Acrida, and locusts. • Rubbing their wings against each other or their legs, the wings or legs containing rows of corrugated bumps. • Brown like body.

Phasmida • The Phasmatodea are an order of insects, whose members are variously known as stick insects, walking sticks or stick-bugs, phasmids, ghost insects and leaf insects. • Some forms are apterous (winged) though often only the male flies. • They have biting and chewing mouthparts and are all phytophagous.

Hemiptera • Most people tend to call anything with lots of legs a "bug. ” • To an entomologist, a "bug" is one of the 35, 000 or so species of the order Hemiptera. • Hemiptera means "half wing" and refers to the fact that part of the first pair of wings is toughened and hard. • Hemipterans also have modified piercing and sucking mouthparts. • Antennae vary and may be either short, or long and conspicuous.

Coleoptera • The main distinguishing characteristic of the Coleoptera is the hardened forewings six legs and antennae. • Complete metamorphoses. • Providing food for amphibians, reptiles, fishes, birds and mammals, a role which they share with most other insects, beetles play other important roles in the environment.

Lepidoptera • Lepidoptera is a large order of insects that includes moths and butterflies. • Lepidopteran species are characterized by more than three derived features, some of the most apparent being the scales covering their bodies and wings, and a proboscis.

Diptera - The order Diptera includes all true flies. - All Dipteran larvae are legless. - Live in fresh water, semi-aquatic, or moist terrestrial environments. - Commonly found in the soil, in plant, and animal tissues - Some species are herbivores, but most feed on dead organic matter or parasitize other animals, especially vertebrates, molluscs, and other arthropods. - These structures are reduced or absent in the more advanced suborders where the larvae, known as maggots, have wormlike bodies and only a pair of mouth hooks for feeding.

Siphonaptera • As adults, all fleas are blood-sucking external parasites. • Most species feed on mammals, although a few live on birds. • Only adult fleas inhabit the host's body and feed on its blood. • They are active insects with a hard exoskeleton, strong hind legs adapted for jumping, and a laterally flattened body that can move easily within the host's fur or feathers. • Unlike lice, most fleas spend a considerable amount of time away from their host. • Adults may live for a year or more and can survive for weeks or months without a blood meal.

Hymenoptera • Ants, Wasps, Bees, Sawflies, Horntails • The Hymenoptera is divided into two suborders: • Symphyta (sawflies and horntails) have a broad junction between thorax and abdomen. • Apocrita (ants, bees, and wasps) have a narrow junction between the thorax and abdomen. • These insects eventually kill their host, but not before completing their own larval development within its body.

Mantodea • Mantids & Praying Mantids • Mantids have elongate bodies that are specialized for a predatory lifestyle. • Long front legs with spines for catching and holding prey, a head that can turn from side to side, and cryptic coloration for hiding in foliage or flowers. - There are only 5 species commonly collected in the United States and 3 of these have been imported from abroad.

Plecoptera • Stoneflies are generally regarded as the earliest group of Neoptera. • Immature stoneflies are aquatic nymphs. • They usually live beneath stones in fast-moving, well-aerated water. Oxygen diffuses through the exoskeleton or into tracheal gills located on the thorax, behind the head, or around the anus. • Most species feed on algae and other submerged vegetation, but two families are predators of mayfly nymphs and other small aquatic insects. • Not active fliers and usually remain near the ground where they feed on algae or lichens. • Stoneflies are most abundant in cool, temperate climates.

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