Episode 132 - Phasmatodea - The Stick & Leaf Bugs
May 15, 2026 · 1 hr 2 min · 17 segments
- Speakers
- The Biologic Podcast HostHost
May 15, 2026 · 1 hr 2 min · 17 segments
This first series began with an overview of insect evolution, followed by a look at the most basal living insect clades, like the dragonflies of Odonata and the various groups of Polyneopteran insect.
I briefly mentioned the Polyneopterans in episode one hundred and twenty-seven on insect evolution.
I described how they're hemimetabolous, meaning they do not undergo a major body reshaping metamorphosis event during the transition from juvenile to adult.
Rather, in these hemimetabolous insects, the juveniles have the same general body form as the adults.
It's just that they're, they're smaller and they grow larger with every molt.
Furthermore, these are winged insects.
Their wings generally develop over time, over multiple successive molts.
For most of these molts, the wings remain as useless wing buds for most of the juvenile stages or the instars.
But by the time they undergo that final molt to become adults, the wings are fully developed within these wing bud capsules, and they're just ready to rupture out of them during the molting process and stretch out and get ready to fly.
This is in contrast to the holometabola, which includes bees and butterflies, whose juvenile forms are quite different than the adult forms, with the adult form being achieved only after an intense, rapid metamorphosis event that radically restructures and reshapes their entire body.
Now, the Polyneopterans that we've looked at so far include a handful of basal clades like the Zoraptera and the Dermaptera, as well as the grasshoppers and the crickets of Orthoptera, the cockroaches and the termites of Blattodea, and the mantises of Mantodea.
In today's episode, we're going to look at the last group of Polyneopteran insects.
This first series began with an overview of insect evolution, followed by a look at the most basal living insect clades, like the dragonflies of Odonata and the various groups of Polyneopteran insect.
I briefly mentioned the Polyneopterans in episode one hundred and twenty-seven on insect evolution.
I described how they're hemimetabolous, meaning they do not undergo a major body reshaping metamorphosis event during the transition from juvenile to adult.
Rather, in these hemimetabolous insects, the juveniles have the same general body form as the adults.
It's just that they're, they're smaller and they grow larger with every molt.
Furthermore, these are winged insects.
Their wings generally develop over time, over multiple successive molts.
For most of these molts, the wings remain as useless wing buds for most of the juvenile stages or the instars.
But by the time they undergo that final molt to become adults, the wings are fully developed within these wing bud capsules, and they're just ready to rupture out of them during the molting process and stretch out and get ready to fly.
This is in contrast to the holometabola, which includes bees and butterflies, whose juvenile forms are quite different than the adult forms, with the adult form being achieved only after an intense, rapid metamorphosis event that radically restructures and reshapes their entire body.
Now, the Polyneopterans that we've looked at so far include a handful of basal clades like the Zoraptera and the Dermaptera, as well as the grasshoppers and the crickets of Orthoptera, the cockroaches and the termites of Blattodea, and the mantises of Mantodea.
In today's episode, we're going to look at the last group of Polyneopteran insects.
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