Pinnate: feather-like; cleft, like the wings of Alucita: with markings resembling a feather: with stiff hairs or thorny processes occupying opposite sides of a thin shank.
Pinnatifid: divided into feathers, as when wings are cleft nearly to the base.
Pistazinus: yellowish green, with a slight brownish tinge [pale green with a little burnt sienna].
Plaga: a spot, stripe or streak of color; a longitudinal spot of irregular form.
Plaited: longitudinally folded or laid in pleats.
Planate: with a flattened surface.
Plane: level, flat; applied to a surface.
Planipennia: applied to Neuroptera in which the wings are large and laid flat on the body wnen at rest; Sialidae, Myrmeleonidae, etc.
Planta -ae: the basal joint of the posterior tarsus in pollen gathering Hymenoptera: the soles of the posterior tarsal joints: the anal clasping legs of caterpillars.
Plantigrade: species that walk on the entire foot, not on the claws alone.
Plantula: a lobe of the divided tarsal pulvillus; one of the soles or climbing cushions of the foot: see arolium; pulviglus.
Plaques: the small leathery hemelytra in some Naucorids.
Plasma: the liquid portion of animal fluids and cells.
Plasticity: the capacity for being formed, moulded or developed.
Plate: any broad flattened piece or sclerite: = squame, in Coccidae.
Platelet: a little plate or sclerite of chitin in a membrane.
Plates: in Coccidae, the squames; q.v.: in male Homoptera, a pair of pieces following the last full ventral segment; usually preceded by a short piece, - the valve.
Platyptera: flat and broad-winged: an ordinal term applied to insects with four net-veined wings, secondaries longitudinally folded beneath primaries; mouth mandibulate; prothorax free; transformations complete: Psocidae, Termitidae, Perlidae and Mallophaga. {Scanner's comment: These four groups are now placed in totally separate orders, and not families as these names imply}
Plecoptera or Plectoptera: plaited winged: an ordinal term applied to net-veined insects in which the secondaries are longitudinally folded beneath primaries; mouth mandibulate; body loosely jointed; prothorax free; metamorphosis incomplete: the term Plecoptera was used by Brauer for Perlidae; Plectoptera by Packard for the Ephemerida: there has been some confusion since, and both have been used in the Brauer sense.
Pleon: = abdomen; q.v.
Pleopoda: abdominal legs of larva: posterior legs of an adult.
Plesiobiosis: see symbiosis.
Plesiotype: any specimen identified with a described or named species by a person other than the describer.
Pleura: plural of pleuron or pleurum: the lateral sclerites between the dorsal and sternal portion of the thorax: in general, the sides of the body between the dorsum and sternum.
Pleural areas: on the metanotum of some Hymenoptera, the three spaces between the lateral and pleural carinae; the 1st or anterior = spiracular area; the 2d or central = middle pleural; the 3d or posterior = angular area.
Pleural carinae: in Hymenoptera, extend along the exterior margin of the metanotum.
Pleural pieces: the lateral sclerites of the thorax; see pleura.
Pleurites: the sclerites into which the pleurum is divided.
Explanation of Terms Used in Entomology · The Wunder Library — complete classics, free to read, with narration.