page_title: Thrips
section_title: Taxonomy
hierarchical_section_title: Thrips / Evolution / Taxonomy
caption_attribution_description: Adult of Franklinothrips vespiformis.
context_page_description: Thrips are minute, slender insects with fringed wings and unique asymmetrical mouthparts. Different thrips species feed mostly on plants by puncturing and sucking up the contents, although a few are predators. Entomologists have described approximately 6,000 species. They fly only weakly and their feathery wings are unsuitable for conventional flight; instead, thrips exploit an unusual mechanism, clap and fling, to create lift using an unsteady circulation pattern with transient vortices near the wings.
  Many thrips species are pests of commercially important crops. A few species serve as vectors for over 20 viruses that cause plant disease, especially the Tospoviruses. Some species of thrips are beneficial as pollinators or as predators of other insects or mites. In the right conditions, such as in greenhouses, many species can exponentially increase in population size and form large swarms because of a lack of natural predators coupled with their ability to reproduce asexually, making them an irritation to humans.
context_section_description: The following families are currently (2013) recognized:
  Suborder Terebrantia 
  Adiheterothripidae Shumsher, 1946 (11 genera)
  Aeolothripidae Uzel, 1895 (29 genera) – banded thrips and broad-winged thrips
  Fauriellidae Priesner, 1949 (four genera)
  †Hemithripidae Bagnall, 1923 (one fossil genus, Hemithrips with 15 species)
  Heterothripidae Bagnall, 1912 (seven genera, restricted to the New World)
  †Jezzinothripidae zur Strassen, 1973 (included by some authors in Merothripidae)
  †Karataothripidae Sharov, 1972 (one fossil species, Karataothrips jurassicus)
  Melanthripidae Bagnall, 1913 (six genera of flower feeders)
  Merothripidae Hood, 1914 (five genera, mostly Neotropical and feeding on dry-wood fungi) – large-legged thrips
  †Scudderothripidae zur Strassen, 1973 (included by some authors in Stenurothripidae)
  Thripidae Stephens, 1829 (292 genera in four subfamilies, flower living) – common thrips
  †Triassothripidae Grimaldi & Shmakov, 2004 (two fossil genera)
  Uzelothripidae Hood, 1952 (one species, Uzelothrips scabrosus)
  Suborder Tubulifera
  Phlaeothripidae  Uzel, 1895 (447 genera in two subfamilies, fungal hyphae and spore feeders)
  The identification of thrips to species is challenging as types are maintained as slide preparations of varying quality over time. There is also considerable variability leading to many species being misidentified. Molecular sequence based approaches have increasingly been applied to their identification.
caption: Adult Franklinothrips vespiformis (Aeolothripidae), a widely distributed tropical species
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