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Key to genera of field crickets (Gryllinae). |
At least two species of this genus occur in North America: an eastern species, here called Miogryllus saussurei, and a southwestern species, Miogryllus lineatus.
The earliest comprehensive study of described species of Miogryllus was by Morgan Hebard (1915) and it was published in the same year as a paper by Rehn & Hebard (1915) which concluded that all native American Gryllus belonged to single “exceedingly plastic species," Gryllus assimilis!
The first paragraph of Hebard’s (1915) paper ends with “There is no question but that in this group [Gryllus, Miogryllus, and Gryllodes] various species exhibit the greatest plasticity found in the Orthoptera and enjoy as wide a distribution as any American forms, excepting those which have been spread by the agency of man. Unless we consider that these great plastic units have always been treated systematically without the following features being realized, the amount of synonymic names for many species would be incomprehensible.”
Hebard then proceeds to sort the 391 specimens of Miogryllus that he has carefully examined and believes to be a “single exceedingly plastic species” into five nominal species:
M. convolutus (Johannson 1763), with 8 synonyms, having dates ranging from 1773 to 1896.
M. ensifer (Scudder 1896), with no synonyms.
M. lineatus (Scudder 1876), with 3 synonyms, having dates ranging from 1896-1901; all described by Scudder!
M. bohlsii (Giglio-Tos 1893), with no synonyms.
M. verticalis (Serville 1839), with 4 synonyms, having dates ranging from 1874-1902.
No key to these five species is provided because, after all, the author considered his 391 specimens to be members of a single species.
In the years after Hebard’s paper was published it was not until the 21st Century that attention was paid to the description of new Miogryllus species. Otte (2006) described three new species (M. amatorius, pammelas, and scythros) from the La Selva Biological Station, Costa Rica, and Otte & Perez-Gelabert, in their Caribbean Crickets, described eight new species from that region. These were M. beliz (Belize, Sittee River), M. bellator (Dominican Republic), M. caparo (Trinidad), M. catacustes (Dominican Republic), M. ergaticos (Dominican Republic), M. guanta (Venezuela, Guanta), M. pugnans (Dominican Republic), M. tobago (Tobago).
The effect of these descriptions of multiple new Miogryllus species within the areas presumably occupied by a single “plastic” species was to discredit the plastic-species hypothesis as applied to Miogryllus.
What then should be the scientific names of the two Miogryllus species currently recognized by SINA? [See maps of the western striped cricket (520m.htm) and of the eastern striped cricket (521m.htm).]
The case of the western striped cricket is simple. The only described species of Miogryllus with a type locality within the range of that species is Miogryllus lineatus, whose holotype is from Arizona, Virgin River to Ft. Mojave.
The case of the eastern striped cricket is more complex. The name currently used is Miogryllus verticalis (Serville 1838) whose type locality is Cayenne, French Guiana (northern South America). This is a remnant of the discredited plastic-species hypothesis. The oldest Miogryllus with a qualifying type locality is Miogryllus saussurei (Scudder 1877) whose syntypes are from Georgia (southeastern U.S.).
The OSFO lists Miogryllus saussurei as a junior synonym of Miogryllus verticalis and under “Scrutiny” notes that “Walker, 2000, Alexander opined that saussurei could not be verticalis with the type locality of Cayenne, French Guiana.”
[TJW, 2020, regrets waiting so long to make the change to M. saussurei in SINA.]
