The Other Insect Societies
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Author(s): J. T. Costa
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674021630
Format: hardback
767pp
Price: £38.95, $59.95, €51
Review Date: 03 October 2006
Review: Up to now, attention to social behaviour of insects has largely been limited to ants, bees, wasps and termites, and less sophisticated and, in general, other arthropod species have been ignored. Here James Costa aims to fill the knowledge gap in the origin and full spread of insect social life. He gives a full account of each major taxonomic group, including the contextual information that is needed to understand the significance of the social behaviour that its constituent species exhibit. There are sections on: orthopteroidea, hemipteroidea, neuropteroidea, panorpoidea and hymenopteroidea, as well as noninsect arthropods. There are 28 colour plates to illustrate the text.