Phaneropteridae

Phaneropteridae Burmeister, 1838 stat. rev.

In contrast to the opinion of Ragge (1968: p.78), we proclaim to re-establish family status for Phaneropteridae . Ragge proposed his idea of a subfamily treatment explicitly based on the work of Ander (1939) who subdivided his superfamily Tettigonioidea into six families, Rhaphidiphoridae, Schizodatylidae, Gryllacrididae, Stenopelmatidae, Prophalangopsidae and Tettigoniidae . Phaneropteridae as a family would not be equivalent to these groups. However, at present these families are considered as belonging to five different superfamilies, with only Gryllacrididae and Stenopelmatidae united in Stenopelmatoidea (see OSF for references). So Ander’s system has considerably changed, and his families are now more or less equal to superfamilies. Ander did not consider any grouping within his Tettigoniidae . Recently, however, the first molecular trees within the Tettigoniidae have been published (e.g., Mugelston et al. 2013) presenting hypotheses about the relationship of the subgroups of Tettigonioidea ( Tettigoniidae). This tree supports the assumption of Gorochov (1995: 93) –based on palaeontology that the mainly plant-feeding Phaneropterinae, Pseudophyllinae (except Pterochrozini; Mugelston et al. 2013), Mecopodinae and Phyllophorinae are one natural unit (clade B; Mugelston et al. 2013). Therefore it is appropriate to give this group family status in our opinion, and we suggest to call it Phaneropteridae (with four subfamilies). Both Phaneropteridae and Pseudophyllidae date back to Burmeister (1838), but Phaneropteridae /inae is by far the most important and species-rich group. The remaining bush-cricket subfamilies are considered as subfamilies of Tettigoniidae until more data are available.