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File:
<orthopt.htm> [For educational purposes
only] Glossary <Principal
Natural Enemy Groups >
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ORTHOPTERA -- <Images> & <Juveniles> [Latest Classification] Please refer also to the following links for details on this
group:
ORTHOPTERA = Photos-1, Photos-2 Most Orthoptera
are not very specialized in food habits.
The name is derived from the Greek ortho meaning straight
and ptera meaning winged.
Although many species have been found to prey on other insects, only
the Mantidae are obligate predators.
There is a strong tendency toward cannibalism in many families, and
feeding on animal supplements plant food (Clausen 1940/62). The order has
paurometabolous or incomplete metamorphosis.
Included are the grasshoppers, crickets and locusts. Many species in
this order produce sound (= stridulation) by rubbing their wings or legs
together,. The wings or legs may
contain rows of corrugated rises. The tympanum or ear is located in the front
tibia in crickets, mole crickets, and katydids, and on the first abdominal
segment in the grasshoppers and locusts. These organisms use vibrations to
locate others of their own species. Grasshoppers are capable
of folding their wings, placing them in the group Neoptera. The body design is generally
cylindrical, with the hind legs being elongated for jumping. They have
mandibulate mouthparts and large compound eye. The presence of ocelli varies with the species. The antennae
have multiple joints, and vary in length. The first and third
thoracic segments are enlarged, while the second segment is a lot shorter.
They have two pairs of wings, which are overlap the abdomen when at rest. The
forewings, or tegmina, are narrower than the hindwings and hardened at their
bases, while the hind wing is membranous, with straight veins and many
cross-veins. At rest, the hindwings are held folded fan-like under the
forewings. The final two to three segments of the abdomen are smaller, and
have cerci of only one segment. Life cycle Orthoptera have a
paurometabolous life cycle or incomplete metamorphosis. The use of sound is
usually important in courtship, and most species produce distinct songs. Most
grasshoppers lay their eggs in the ground or on vegetation. The eggs hatch
and the young nymphs resemble adults but lack wings. At this stage they are sometimes referred to as hoppers. They may
also have a very different coloration from the adults. Through successive
molts the nymphs develop wings until their final moult into a mature adult
with fully developed wings. The number of molts
varies among species, and growth is also very variable and may last a few
weeks to months depending on the availability of food and weather conditions. Families = = = = = = = = = = = = = References: Please refer to <biology.ref.htm>,
[Additional references may be found at:
MELVYL Library] Gordon,
David George (1998), The eat-a-bug cookbook, Ten Speed Press, pp. 3, Hoell, H.V., Doyen, J.T. & Purcell, A.H. (1998). Introduction to
Insect Biology and Diversity, 2nd ed.. Oxford University Press.
pp. 392–394. Imes, Rick
(1992), The practical entomologist, Simon and Schuster, pp. 74–75. Zhou Z, Ye H, Huang Y, Shi F. (2010) The
phylogeny of Orthoptera inferred from mtDNA and description of Elimaea
cheni (Tettigoniidae: Phaneropterinae) mitogenome. J. Genet. Genomics.
37(5):315-324 |