Neuroptera

Description

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles
available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. The insect order
Neuroptera, or net-winged insects, includes the lacewings, mantidflies,
antlions, and their relatives. The order contains some 6,010 species.
Traditionally, the group that was once known as Planipennia, with the
Neuroptera at that time also including alderflies, fishflies,
dobsonflies and snakeflies, but these are now generally considered to be
separate orders (the Megaloptera and Raphidioptera). Sometimes the name
Neuropterida is used to refer to these three orders as a group. This is
either placed at superorder rank, with the Endopterygota becoming an
unranked clade above it, or the Endopterygota are maintained as a
superorder, with an unranked Neuropterida being a part of them. Within
the endopterygotes, the closest living relatives of the neuropteridan
clade are the beetles. The common name lacewings is often used for the
most widely known net-winges insects – the green lacewings (Chrysopidae)
– but actually most members of the Neuroptera are referred to as some
sort of „lacewing“.