Talk:Sucking louse

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Two species of Anoplura are parasites of humans. Pediculus humanus is divided into two subspecies, Pediculus humanus humanus (the body louse) and Pediculus humanus capitis (the head louse). Phthirus pubis (the pubic louse) is the cause of the embarrassing condition known as crabs.

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color me stupid but isn't that three... Are we sure that there are only three (I thought there were a few subspecies that everyone thought were the same... but I could be wrong)... - Reboot

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That picture is actually of Mallophaga, the other suborder of lice. The head is wider than prothorax.

{{ping|Cougroyalty}} Just wanted to ask about the change to superfamily because I was looking through taxonomy databases and other sources (see [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Taxonomy/Browser/wwwtax.cgi?mode=Info&id=30005&lvl=3&lin=f&keep=1&srchmode=1&unlock here] [https://study.com/academy/lesson/anoplura-definition-characteristics-species.html here] and [https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=103344#null here]) that are all saying it is a suborder, not a superfamily. Was just wondering where that came from. Sophisticatedevening🍷^(talk) 18:36, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

:I'll try to summarize the issue as best I can. Book lice/bark lice/bark flies used to be considered part of the Order Psocoptera, and then the parasitic lice were grouped into the Order Phthiraptera - and together, both of these fell under the larger Superorder Psocodea. However, it has recently been discovered in a 2021 study{{Cite journal|last1=de Moya|first1=Robert S|last2=Yoshizawa|first2=Kazunori|last3=Walden|first3=Kimberly K O|last4=Sweet|first4=Andrew D|last5=Dietrich|first5=Christopher H|last6=Kevin P|first6=Johnson|date=2021-06-16|editor-last=Buckley|editor-first=Thomas|title=Phylogenomics of Parasitic and Nonparasitic Lice (Insecta: Psocodea): Combining Sequence Data and Exploring Compositional Bias Solutions in Next Generation Data Sets|url=https://academic.oup.com/sysbio/article/70/4/719/5912026|journal=Systematic Biology|language=en|volume=70|issue=4|pages=719–738|doi=10.1093/sysbio/syaa075|pmid=32979270|issn=1063-5157|doi-access=free}} that the parasitic lice of Phthiraptera actually evolved later, within the larger Psocoptera group. This rendered Psocoptera as paraphyletic, and thus no longer a "valid" grouping under phylogentic taxonomy. As a result, Psocodea was also ranked as an Order at this point. If you check the cladogram on the Louse (Phthiraptera) page, you'll see that Anoplura is under Phthiraptera, which is under the Suborder Troctomorpha, which is under the Order Psocodea. While Anoplura was previously ranked as a suborder, and that 2021 de Moya et al. study recognized the previous ranking, based on the new study, it could no longer be a suborder, since it is several ranks below an existing suborder (Troctomorpha). In Table 3 of the 2021 study, you can see the old and new proposed rankings. Psocodea becomes an Order replacing Psocoptera, Phthiraptera moves from Order to an Infraorder within Troctomorpha, and then Anoplura moves from a Suborder to a Parvorder. I see that this has since also been adopted by the Psocodea Species File website.{{Cite web| website = Psocodea species file online, Version 5.0 |title = Phthiraptera Haeckel, 1896 |last1 = Hopkins |first1 = H. |last2 = Johnson |first2 = K. P. |last3 = Smith |first3 = V. S. |url = https://psocodea.speciesfile.org/otus/878997/overview}} You can click down to Anoplura on that website and see that it also has it ranked as a Parvorder. The sources you cited do not seem as reliable, and are perhaps just out of date. But regardless, it would be impossible for Anoplura to be a suborder, since it is now classified as belonging to another suborder. I'll concede that it is not a superfamily, at least. So I'm going to go ahead and set it as a Parvorder based on these two sources I cited. Cougroyalty (talk) 20:50, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

::Pavorder works for me, thanks for the explanation. I'll set the autobox to that then. Sophisticatedevening🍷^(talk) 20:55, 9 May 2025 (UTC)

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