Current Science

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Many plant-feeding insects have evolved as generalists, living and feeding on plants. Insects have existed from the Devonian (410–355 million years ago [mya]) synchronizing with the diversification of woody angiosperms1. Sometime between the Devonian and the Carboniferous, utilization of sori of early Filicophyta as food existed concurrently in extinct groups of insects2. This could also be the period when a majority of the phloem-feeding Hemiptera evolved. Insect- feeding damage, possibly caused by hemipteroids, has been known in the fossil specimens of Metzgeriothallus sharonae (Marchantiophyta: Metzgeriales) of the Middle Devonian3. An extensive volume of publications explains the dynamics of insect–plant interactions, customarily the term ‘plant’ implying angiosperms. However, our knowledge of insects that live and feed on lower plants, such as bryophytes, is limited. This note aims to provide a brief review on the subtlety of interactions between bryophytes and insects, as much as known.
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