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Print Fact SheetHeterothripidae

Australian fauna

No member of this Family is known from Australia.

Biology

Of the 90 species currently listed in this family, all but the five Aulacothrips species are considered to be phytophagous. They feed and breed in flowers, presumably exhibiting a high level of host specificity (Mound & Marullo, 1996), and pupate in a silken cocoon at soil level. Aulacothrips species breed on, and pupate on, the tergites of particular Homoptera,  feeding as ectoparasites on these bugs (Izzo et al., 2002; Cavalleri & Kaminski, 2014).

Geographic distribution

Members of this family are known only from the Americas, and keys to many species are provided by Mound & Marullo (1996), and Pereyra & Cavalleri (2012). Species of Heterothrips have been described between New York and Illinois in the North and Argentina in the South, whereas the species of the other three genera are known only from the Neotropics.

Recognition

Species of Heterothripidae all have nine antennal segments, the distal segments being more or less distinct from each other, and the sensoria on segments III and IV form a continuous band. In most species this sensorium is only around the segment apex, but in Lenkothrips it extends as a loop to the midpoint of both segments, and in Aulacothrips it is looped and highly convoluted (Cavalleri & Kaminski, 2014). In the head the tentorial bridge is not developed, and sternite VII in females lacks the pair of accessory setae retained in Aeolothripidae that are considered to be derived from the ancestral sternite VIII. The metanotal median setae are close to the posterior margin, but the fore wings are slender with two almost continuous rows of veinal setae. Prominent setae are developed only in Aulacothrips, but most species have conspicuous microtrichial combs on the posterior margins of the tergites.

Genus and species diversity

Four genera are recognised in this family, with a further three genera known only from fossils (ThripsWiki 2020). Heterothrips includes almost 80 species, Lenkothrips and Aulacothrips each include five species, and Scutothrips four species.

Family relationships

Heterothripidae species are unusual in having the sensoria on the third and fourth antennal segments forming a continuous band, a condition also found in a few Melanthripidae. However, no Heterothripidae have a pair of lobes at the posterior margin of sternite VIII as in Melanthripidae and Merothripidae. Bhatti (2006) proposed that the family Heterothripidae should be considered as a superfamily, Heterothripoidea, and he placed Aulacothrips in a new family Aulacothripidae. The unusual structure of Aulacothrips species is presumably related to their remarkable ectoparasitic biology, and there is no reason to consider the genus sister taxon to the other Heterothripidae (Mound & Morris, 2007).

Thysanoptera systematics

The classification adopted here is a compromise between practicality and the ideal of a classification based on phylogenetic relationships. The two sub-orders, Terebrantia and Tubulifera, are probably sister-groups (Buckman et al., 2013), but relationships among the eight families of Terebrantia remain far from clear (and there are also five families based on fossils - see ThripsWiki 2020). A radically different classification was proposed by Bhatti (1994, 1998, 2006) that recognised two Orders, 10 superfamilies and 40 families, but that classification is based on autapomorphies rather than synapomorphies, and is thus essentially phenetic rather than phylogenetic. 

References

Bhatti JS (1994) Phylogenetic relationships among Thysanoptera (Insecta) with particular reference to the families of the Order Tubulifera. Zoology (Journal of Pure and Applied Zoology) 4 (1993): 93–130.

Bhatti JS (1998) New structural features in the Order Tubulifera (Insecta). 1. Amalgamation of labro-maxillary complex with cranium and other cephalic structures. Zoology (Journal of Pure and Applied Zoology) 5: 147–176.

Bhatti JS (2006) The classification of Terebrantia (Insecta) into families. Oriental Insects 40: 339–375.

Buckman RS, Mound LA & Whiting MF (2013) Phylogeny of thrips (Insecta: Thysanoptera) based on five molecular loci. Systematic Entomology 38: 123–133.

Cavalleri A & Kaminski LA (2014) Two new ectoparasitic species of Aulacothrips Hood, 1952 (Thysanoptera: Heterothripidae) associated with ant-tended treehoppers (Hemiptera). Systematic Parasitology 89: 271–278.

Izzo TJ, Pinent SMJ & Mound LA (2002) Aulacothrips dictyotus (Heterothripidae), the first ectoparasitic thrips (Thysanoptera). Florida Entomologist 85: 281–283.

Mound LA & Marullo R (1996) The Thrips of Central and South America: An Introduction. Memoirs on Entomology, International 6: 1–488.

Mound LA & Morris DC (2007) The insect Order Thysanoptera: classification versus systematics. Pp 395-411, in Zhang ZQ & Shear WA [eds], Linnaeus Tercentenary: Progress in Invertebrate Taxonomy. Zootaxa 1668: 1–766. http://www.mapress.com/zootaxa/2007f/zt01668p411.pdf

Pereyra V & Cavalleri A (2012) The genus Heterothrips (Thysanoptera) in Brazil, with an identification key and seven new species. Zootaxa 3237: 1–23.

ThripsWiki (2020) ThripsWiki - providing information on the World's thrips. Available from: http://thrips.info/wiki/Main_Page [accessed 29.x.2019].