The purpose of this site is to present general and technical information concerning delphacid planthoppers, and in particular about delphacid species that occur, or may be invasive, in North America. Delphacid planthoppers are of particular interest as potential pests and invasive species both from direct feeding on economic plants and as vectors of a number of plant disease viruses. 

The central focus of this website is the development of online interactive identification guides to North American delphacid species and potentially invasive species using Lucid3 software (the first of the identification guides should be online in 2010).  The identification guides will be supplemented by an interactive morphology guide to help users with the technical terms. The identification guides will be developed with state and federal identifiers, port inspectors, USDA APHIS PPQ, and extension services in mind in particular, but also both biological scientists and a more general audience should find them of value.

The general content of this site will include delphacid recognition, biology, collecting, specimen preparation, economic importance, morphology, checklists of New World species, and a bibliography (including a digital library for select literature).  Much of the content of this site will be under construction for the immediately foreseeable future.