Präparierte Heuschrecke mit geöffneten Flügeln, Vorderflügel grün, Hinterflügel rosafarben, vor neutralem Hintergrund

Sub-collection

Hemimetabola

The sub-collection is among Europe's most important entomological collections, comprising over one million specimens. It documents the diversity of hemimetabolous insects and related hexapod groups based on more than 200 years of scientific collecting.

Overview

The Hemimetabola sub-collection brings together insect and other hexapod groups from around the world that undergo incomplete metamorphosis. As a historically grown collection, it also includes taxa that are neither closely related nor truly hemimetabolous.

Its geographic strengths lie in Africa, with substantial holdings from South America, the Oriental Region, and the Palearctic.

The sub-collection contains well over one million specimens and numerous type specimens. Particularly significant are:

  • Hemiptera (true bugs and hoppers) with more than 620,000 specimens representing at least 11,100 species
  • Orthoptera (grasshoppers, crickets and katydids) with around 300,000 specimens and approximately 3,000 primary types

The Orthoptera collection is among the world's leading grasshopper collections and the largest of its kind in Germany.

Most material is preserved as pinned dry specimens housed in insect drawers. The sub-collection also includes numerous microscope slides – especially of Mallophaga (chewing lice) – and an extensive wet collection containing approximately 13,300 jars.

Among the groups represented are:

  • Ephemeroptera (mayflies)
  • Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies)
  • Orthoptera (grasshoppers, crickets and katydids)
  • Phasmida (stick and leaf insects)
  • Plecoptera (stoneflies)
  • Dermaptera (earwigs)
  • Mantodea (mantises)
  • Blattodea (cockroaches)
  • Thysanoptera (thrips)
  • Heteroptera (true bugs)
  • Coleorrhyncha (moss bugs)
  • Fulgoromorpha and Cicadomorpha (planthoppers and leafhoppers)
  • Psocoptera (booklice and barklice)
  • Mallophaga (chewing lice)
  • Anoplura (sucking lice)

The sub-collection also includes primitively wingless insects such as Archaeognatha (jumping bristletails) and Zygentoma (silverfish), as well as other hexapod groups including Diplura (two-pronged bristletails), Collembola (springtails) and Protura (coneheads).

The museum's library also maintains a collection-related reference section covering the insect groups represented in the collection, including important monographs, catalogues and an extensive reprint collection.

Access

Due to construction work and collection relocations as part of our Museum Evolution, the Hemimetabola sub-collection is currently not accessible. Visits as well as new loan and imaging requests cannot be accommodated at present. Previously borrowed material can still be returned.

Parts of the sub-collection are already available in digital form. For example, all Orthoptera type specimens have been digitised through the DORSA project. Additional datasets, including Auchenorrhyncha, Heteroptera and Isoptera, are also available online, and parts of the insect drawers have been digitally imaged.

Contact

History

The oldest holdings date back to the founding years of the Museum für Naturkunde. Many specimens entered the sub-collection through nineteenth- and early twentieth-century expeditions to Africa, South America and Southeast Asia.

Early collectors include:

  • Adelbert von Chamisso (1781–1838)
  • Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg (1795–1876)
  • Johann Centurius von Hoffmannsegg (1766–1849)

Martin Hinrich Lichtenstein (1780–1857), Director of the Zoological Museum from 1815 to 1857, also contributed insect material collected in South Africa that remains preserved today.

Many historical holdings originated in the context of colonial-era scientific expeditions. These collecting histories are now being critically examined through ongoing provenance and collection history research.

Since the 1990s, the sub-collection has continued to grow, particularly through fieldwork in Africa and Europe.

Research

The Hemimetabola sub-collection provides an important resource for international research in morphology, phylogenetics and evolutionary ecology.

Its greatest strengths include:

  • numerous type specimens
  • historical material from diverse regions of the world
  • extensive unidentified and unsorted holdings with high research potential

The sub-collection is particularly valuable for investigating historical biodiversity, biogeographic change, evolutionary adaptations and long-term ecosystem dynamics.

One current research focus concerns the Lygaeinae (seed bugs). Many species sequester toxic compounds from their host plants and use them as chemical defence against predators. The sub-collection supports interdisciplinary research linking zoology, botany and toxicology.

In addition, historical specimens are increasingly being studied using non-destructive molecular and chemical methods, opening new opportunities for biodiversity and evolutionary research.