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Complete Metamorphosis
Holometabolism, also called complete metamorphosis, is a form of insect development which includes four life stages: egg, larva, pupa, and imago (or adult). Holometabolism is a synapomorphic trait of all insects in the superorder Endopterygota. Immature stages of holometabolous insects are very different from the mature stage. In some species the holometabolous life cycle prevents larvae from competing with adults because they inhabit different ecological niches. The morphology and behavior of each stage are adapted for different activities. For example, larval traits maximize feeding, growth, and development, while adult traits enable dispersal, mating, and egg laying. Some species of holometabolous insects protect and feed their offspring. Other insect developmental strategies include ametabolism and hemimetabolism. Developmental stages There are four general developmental stages, each with its own morphology and function. Egg The first stage of the insect life cycle is the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diapause
In animal dormancy, diapause is the delay in development in response to regular and recurring periods of adverse environmental conditions.Tauber, M.J., Tauber, C.A., Masaki, S. (1986) ''Seasonal Adaptations of Insects''. Oxford University Press It is a physiological state with very specific initiating and inhibiting conditions. The mechanism is a means of surviving predictable, unfavorable environmental conditions, such as temperature extremes, drought, or reduced food availability. Diapause is observed in all the life stages of arthropods, especially insects. Embryonic diapause, a somewhat similar phenomenon, occurs in over 130 species of mammals, possibly even in humans, and in the embryos of many of the oviparous species of fish in the order Cyprinodontiformes. Activity levels of diapausing stages can vary considerably among species. Diapause may occur in a completely immobile stage, such as the pupae and eggs, or it may occur in very active stages that undergo extensive migrat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vermiform
Vermiform (ˈvərməˌfôrm) describes something shaped like a worm. The expression is often employed in biology and anatomy to describe usually soft body parts or animals that are more or less tubular or cylindrical. The word root is Latin, ''vermes'' (worms) and ''formes'' (shaped). A well known example is the vermiform appendix, a small, blind section of the gut in humans and a number of other mammals. A number of soft-bodied animal phyla are typically described as vermiform. The better-known ones are undoubtedly the annelids (earthworm and relatives) and the roundworms (a very common, mainly parasitic group), but a number of less-well-known phyla answer to the same description. Examples range from the minute parasitic mesozoans to the larger-bodied free-living phyla like ribbon worms, peanut worms, and priapulids Priapulida (priapulid worms, from Gr. πριάπος, ''priāpos'' ' Priapus' + Lat. ''-ul-'', diminutive), sometimes referred to as penis worms, is a phylum o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scarabaeidae
The family Scarabaeidae, as currently defined, consists of over 30,000 species of beetles worldwide; they are often called scarabs or scarab beetles. The classification of this family has undergone significant change in recent years. Several subfamilies have been elevated to family rank (e.g., Bolboceratidae, Geotrupidae, Glaresidae, Glaphyridae, Hybosoridae, Ochodaeidae, and Pleocomidae), and some reduced to lower ranks. The subfamilies listed in this article are in accordance with those in Bouchard (2011). Description Scarabs are stout-bodied beetles, many with bright metallic colours, measuring between . They have distinctive, clubbed antennae composed of plates called lamellae that can be compressed into a ball or fanned out like leaves to sense odours. Many species are fossorial, with legs adapted for digging. In some groups males (and sometimes females) have prominent horns on the head and/or pronotum to fight over mates or resources. The largest fossil scaraba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beetle
Beetles are insects that form the order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Endopterygota. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 400,000 described species, is the largest of all orders, constituting almost 40% of described insects and 25% of all known animal life-forms; new species are discovered frequently, with estimates suggesting that there are between 0.9 and 2.1 million total species. Found in almost every habitat except the sea and the polar regions, they interact with their ecosystems in several ways: beetles often feed on plants and fungi, break down animal and plant debris, and eat other invertebrates. Some species are serious agricultural pests, such as the Colorado potato beetle, while others such as Coccinellidae (ladybirds or ladybugs) eat aphids, scale insects, thrips, and other plant-sucking insects that damage crops. Beetles typically have a particularly hard e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nematocera
The Nematocera (the name means "thread-horns") are a suborder of elongated flies with thin, segmented antennae and mostly aquatic larvae. This group is paraphyletic and contains all flies but species from suborder Brachycera (the name means "short-horns"), which includes more commonly known species as housefly or the common fruit fly. Families in Nematocera include mosquitoes, crane flies, gnats, black flies, and a multiple groups of families described as midges. The Nematocera typically have fairly long, fine, finely-jointed antennae. In many species, such as most mosquitoes, the female antennae are more or less threadlike, but the males have spectacularly plumose antennae. The larvae of most families of Nematocera are aquatic, either free-swimming, rock-dwelling, plant-dwelling, or luticolous. Some families however, are not aquatic; for instance the Tipulidae tend to be soil-dwelling and the Mycetophilidae feed on fungi such as mushrooms. Unlike most of the Brachycera, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sawfly
Sawflies are the insects of the suborder Symphyta within the order Hymenoptera, alongside ants, bees, and wasps. The common name comes from the saw-like appearance of the ovipositor, which the females use to cut into the plants where they lay their eggs. The name is associated especially with the Tenthredinoidea, by far the largest superfamily in the suborder, with about 7,000 known species; in the entire suborder, there are 8,000 described species in more than 800 genera. Symphyta is paraphyletic, consisting of several basal groups within the order Hymenoptera, each one rooted inside the previous group, ending with the Apocrita which are not sawflies. The primary distinction between sawflies and the Apocrita – the ants, bees, and wasps – is that the adults lack a "wasp waist", and instead have a broad connection between the abdomen and the thorax. Some sawflies are Batesian mimics of wasps and bees, and the ovipositor can be mistaken for a stinger. Sawflies vary in len ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lepidoptera
Lepidoptera ( ) is an order (biology), order of insects that includes butterfly, butterflies and moths (both are called lepidopterans). About 180,000 species of the Lepidoptera are described, in 126 Family (biology), families and 46 Taxonomic rank, superfamilies, 10 percent of the total described species of living organisms. It is one of the most widespread and widely recognizable insect orders in the world. The Lepidoptera show many variations of the basic body structure that have evolved to gain advantages in lifestyle and distribution. Recent estimates suggest the order may have more species than earlier thought, and is among the four most wikt:speciose, speciose orders, along with the Hymenoptera, fly, Diptera, and beetle, Coleoptera. Lepidopteran species are characterized by more than three derived features. The most apparent is the presence of scale (anatomy), scales that cover the torso, bodies, wings, and a proboscis. The scales are modified, flattened "hairs", and give ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caterpillar
Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder Symphyta) are commonly called caterpillars as well. Both lepidopteran and symphytan larvae have eruciform body shapes. Caterpillars of most species eat plant material ( often leaves), but not all; some (about 1%) eat insects, and some are even cannibalistic. Some feed on other animal products. For example, clothes moths feed on wool, and horn moths feed on the hooves and horns of dead ungulates. Caterpillars are typically voracious feeders and many of them are among the most serious of agricultural pests. In fact, many moth species are best known in their caterpillar stages because of the damage they cause to fruits and other agricultural produce, whereas the moths are obscure and do no direct harm. Conversely, various species of caterpi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eruciform
Eruciform (literally: "caterpillar-shaped") is the entomological term describing a certain class of shapes of insect larvae. Origin and application The word ''eruciform'' literally means "caterpillar-shaped" (from Latin "eruca", a caterpillar — confusingly, in Latin "Eruca" also was used as the name for a rape-like plant, but that has no clear connection to the current context). The term encompasses many variations in shape. Some larvae, for example, are in fact shaped like certain other, straight, eruciform larvae, except that they are curved into a C-shape. These are called "scarabaeiform" because it is the typical form of the larvae of the Scarabaeidae—the scarab beetles and their relatives. In contrast, larvae of the Curculionidae — the weevils — are also called "apodous eruciform", (literally meaning legless caterpillar-shaped; unlike scarab larvae, they do not have legs). This seems rather inconsistent, because commonly weevil larvae are almost as C-shaped as s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Click Beetle
Elateridae or click beetles (or "typical click beetles" to distinguish them from the related families Cerophytidae and Eucnemidae, which are also capable of clicking) are a family of beetles. Other names include elaters, snapping beetles, spring beetles or skipjacks. This family was defined by William Elford Leach (1790–1836) in 1815. They are a cosmopolitan beetle family characterized by the unusual click mechanism they possess. There are a few other families of Elateroidea in which a few members have the same mechanism, but most elaterid subfamilies can click. A spine on the prosternum can be snapped into a corresponding notch on the mesosternum, producing a violent "click" that can bounce the beetle into the air. Clicking is mainly used to avoid predation, although it is also useful when the beetle is on its back and needs to right itself. There are about 9300 known species worldwide, and 965 valid species in North America. Etymology Leach took the family name from the g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wireworm
Elateridae or click beetles (or "typical click beetles" to distinguish them from the related families Cerophytidae and Eucnemidae, which are also capable of clicking) are a family of beetles. Other names include elaters, snapping beetles, spring beetles or skipjacks. This family was defined by William Elford Leach (1790–1836) in 1815. They are a cosmopolitan beetle family characterized by the unusual click mechanism they possess. There are a few other families of Elateroidea in which a few members have the same mechanism, but most elaterid subfamilies can click. A spine on the prosternum can be snapped into a corresponding notch on the mesosternum, producing a violent "click" that can bounce the beetle into the air. Clicking is mainly used to avoid predation, although it is also useful when the beetle is on its back and needs to right itself. There are about 9300 known species worldwide, and 965 valid species in North America. Etymology Leach took the family name from the ge ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_larvae.jpg "Click for more on -> Sawfly")
_larvae_on_willow%2C_Arnhem%2C_the_Netherlands.jpg "Click for more on -> Eruciform")
