36 Introduction

Introduction

This week’s lab will cover the orthopteroid orders, with an emphasis on those taxa found in northern BC. Your goal is to learn how to identify various common insects to order and/or family level using the keys in your text, online resources, other students, and me (when in doubt, ask an entomologist). The lab should take you approximately three hours to complete. A short quiz will be available when you have finished the lab, so that you can practice your identification skills.

The orthopteroids include several orders of insects:

• Plecoptera, the stoneflies;
• Dermaptera, the earwigs;
• Orthoptera, the grasshoppers, crickets, and katydids;
• Blattodea, the cockroaches and termites;
• Phasmatodea, the stick and leaf insects;
• and Mantodea, the mantises

Several other, mostly tropical, orders are also included for interest, but you will not be expected to identify them. Only the Orthoptera will be identified to family in the lab, and only a few families will be covered. If your collection includes orders or families not covered in the lab, they still need to be identified to family. If you need help with that, please let me know!