Dictyoptera (from Ancient Greek diktuon "net" + pteron "wing") includes three groups of polyneopterous insects - cockroaches ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blattaria" rel="nofollow - Blattaria ), termites ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isoptera" rel="nofollow - Isoptera ) and mantis ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantodea" rel="nofollow - Mantodea ). While all modern Dictyoptera have short http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovipositor" rel="nofollow - ovipositors , the oldest fossils of Dictyoptera have long ovipositors, much like members of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthoptera" rel="nofollow - Orthoptera .

The use of the term Dictyoptera has changed over the years, and while largely out of use for much of the last century, it is becoming more widely used. It is usually considered a superorder, with Isoptera, Blattaria and Mantodea being its three orders. In some classifications, however, Dictyoptera is shifted to order status. Regardless, in all classifications the three constituent groups are the same, just treated at different rank. Termites and cockroaches are very closely related, with ecological and molecular data pointing to a relationship with the cockroach genus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptocercus" rel="nofollow - Cryptocercus (Lo et al., 2000.).

Based on genetic evidence, the closest living relatives of the Dictyoptera are the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phasmatodea" rel="nofollow - phasmids and the enigmatic groups http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantophasmatodea" rel="nofollow - Mantophasmatodea and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grylloblattodea" rel="nofollow - Grylloblattodea . If the Dictyoptera are considered a superorder these three orders might be included in it (Cameron et al., 2006).

my three favourite species of insects, couse they serve certain fealings in us humans, horrid, discuss, fright, awe, amazment, facination, loss of apetite, plague, illeness,
they influence science, horrormovies, science fiction, our wildest imagination and our worst nightmares, think of being trapped inside a termite nest, or being stranded on an island with only cockroaches as the only other living species, or being hunted by a elephant sized mantis, ISENT THESE CREATURS AWESOME