The Katydids are a part of the family Tettigoniidae and the order Orthoptera which comprises of insects like grasshoppers, crickets, locusts, etc. Interestingly enough, “formal investigations into katydid phylogenetic relationships have never been published… this lack of a published phylogeny has made it difficult to decipher the evolutionary patterns in katydid morphology” (Mugleston, 2013).

The recurring feature of the katydids in my past blog posts is their complex acoustic signaling. It plays an important role in sexual selection, claiming territory, and sometimes attracting prey. Therefore, it only makes sense that the “shape of size of the organs associated with katydid hearing are one of the characters used to delineate tettigoniid subfamilies” (Mugleston, 2013). The acoustic signaling in katydids is one of the main features that unifies members of the family Tettigoniidae.

In the phylogeny I have chosen, the katydid family Tettigoniidae is differentiated into subfamilies based on features like the leaf-like tegmina and the thoracic spiracle which is an organ responsible for the acoustic signaling in katydids. In regards to my organism, the broad-winged katydid (Microcentrum rhombifolium) is part of the subfamily Phaneropterinae in the clade B.

This figure depicts the phylogeny of all the Tettigoniidae subfamilies in the Clade B. The picture is not clear, but if you click on the link it will take you to a clearer picture!

The family Tettigoniidae is found to be closely related to the suborder Ensifera which is a suborder of the order Orthoptera. In fact, “Sharov found fossil evidence to support Tettigoniidae as sister to all the remaining ensiferan families” (Mugleston, 2013). One of these families is the Grylloidea family which includes the “true crickets”. In the article, they found that these crickets were the sister family to Tettigoniidae based on ribosomal data. The relationship between the true crickets and the katydids seem to be the anatomy of the insects. Both crickets and katydids look similar because their “antennas are much thinner and longer” but the difference lies in their legs which are aligned with the body in katydids and perpendicular in crickets (Grasshopper, crickets and katydid, how to differentiate them…, 2019).

References:

Mugleston, J. D., Song, H., & Whiting, M. F. (2013). A century of paraphyly: A molecular phylogeny of katydids (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae) supports multiple origins of leaf-like wings. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 69(3), 1120-1134.

Grasshopper, crickets and katydid, how to differentiate them ? (2019, January 15).