Orders

• Coleoptera


  Beetles

  
  

  Identifiable Features:

  Adults: hardened forewings, straight line down back

  Larva: distinct head, chewing mouthparts, three pairs of well-developed legs with tarsal claws at the end of each leg

  
• Hemiptera


  True Bugs

  
  

  Identifiable Features:

  Adults: sucking and piercing mouthparts (beak), usually two different textured wings (hardened and membranous)

  Immatures: wingless nymphs

  
• Diptera


  Flies

  
  

  Identifiable Features:

  Adults: 1 pair of wings and halteres

  Larva: maggots, no head

  
• Lepidoptera


  Butterflies and Moths

  Identifiable Features:

  Adults: Scale-covered wings, proboscis mouth part

  Larva: Well-developed heads, chewing mouthparts, 2-5 pairs of fleshy prolegs and usually three pairs of thoracic legs (larvae are hard to distinguish what species based on visual ID)

  
• Thysanoptera


  Thrips

  Identifiable Features:

  Adults: Tiny insects with fringed wings and a bladder (ball) at the end of the leg – no tarsal claws. Oblong. Mouthpart unique, vestigial right mandible is used as stylet and the left mandible scrapes the surface.

  Nymphs: wing buds

  
• Hymenoptera


  Ants, Bees, Wasps & Sawflies

  Wasps v. bees: look at the hairs

  • Wasp have singular hairs
  • Bees have branched hair (fluffy)
• Blattodea (and Isoptera)


  Cockroaches (and Termites)

  
• Orthoptera


  Grasshoppers, Katydids and Crickets