Dinidoridae

The Dinidoridae are a small family of insects comprising about a hundred species in sixteen genera in the Hemipteran suborder Heteroptera, the 'true bugs'. As a group the family does not have any common name. Until the late 19th century they were generally regarded as a subfamily of the Pentatomidae. Most members of the family Dinidoridae are large and robust in build; the bodies of some species may exceed 27 mm in length. In shape they are ovoid to oblong. The head and pronotum have lateral keels. The scutellum is moderately short and blunt, typically some 50% of the abdominal length. The antennae have four or five segments, with at least two of the subapical segments more or less flattened. The antenniferous tubercles are set below the lateral head margins, and are not visible from above. The tarsi have two or three segments. In most genera trichobothria occur in pairs on the third to the seventh abdominal sterna, but Eumenotes species have only one trichobothrium per segment. Each pair of trichobothria is arranged transversely on a large callus mesad of the abdominal spiracles. The taxon corresponding to the modern family Dinidoridae was originally established by Stål in 1870 as the subfamily Dinidorida of the family Pentatomidae. Subsequent authorities such as Lethierry and Severin applied the name Dinidoridae, but in a subfamily sense in spite of the implication of the suffix '-dae'. Twentieth century authorities treated the Dinidoridae as a distinct family, which now is the established view. Two subfamilies are generally recognised, the Dinidorinae and the Megymeninae. They may be distinguished as follows: