Discriminating two sympatric species of Acinipe (Orthoptera: Pamphagidae) on the basis of egg-pod and egg morphologies

Abstract Although egg-pods and egg morphology represent useful features for phylogenetic purposes, they are less well known in Pamphagidae when compared with other Orthoptera groups of Caelifera, such as Acrididae. Breeding in the lab some specimens of Acinipe deceptoria (Bolivar, 1878) and Acinipe segurensis (Bolivar, 1908), two sympatric species inhabiting the Southeastern Iberian Peninsula, allowed us to study in detail such structures. The morphology of the egg-pods of both species is very similar and almost undistinguishable. The eggs general morphology is also similar. However, some chorionic features, such as the chorionic mesh-size and the micropyle morphology, make possible to distinguish between both species thus being useful for taxonomic applications. On the other hand, our observations on presence of egg-pods and micropyles arrangement support the classical systematics of Orthoptera splitting it in two suborders.