elytra - Hutchinson encyclopedia article about elytra Printer Friendly
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elytra

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elytra

Horny wing cases characteristic of beetles. The elytra are adapted from the beetles' forewings (only the hindwings are used for flight). They fold over the back, generally meeting in the middle in a straight line, and serve to protect the hindwings and the soft posterior parts of the body.

Elytra are also to be found in earwigs.

In Hemiptera (true bugs) the forewings are hardened over half their length and are known as hemelytra. In Orthoptera (crickets, grasshoppers, and locusts) the forewings are greatly thickened and are known as tegmina.



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? Mentioned in ? References in classic literature
 
This case presents no difficulty on my view, for a hooked seed might be transported to an island by some other means; and the plant then becoming slightly modified, but still retaining its hooked seeds, would form an endemic species, having as useless an appendage as any rudimentary organ,--for instance, as the shrivelled wings under the soldered elytra of many insular beetles.
The Origin of Species by Darwin, Charles View in context
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