Tribe Sclerogryllini Gorochov, 1985

Remarks. This tribe was described by Saussure (1877) as “Légion des Scléropterites”, including Acanthoplistus Saussure, 1877, and Scleropterus Haan, 1844. Subsequently, this taxon was treated as a subfamily by Shiraki (1930), and this status was followed by Chopard (1934, 1936) and Desutter (1987).

Gorochov (1985) proposed a new name Sclerogryllus for Scleropterus Haan, 1844, which has been used for Scleropterus Schoenherr, 1825 (Coleoptera). At the same time, Gorochov also established the tribal status as Sclerogryllini, with Sclerogryllus as the type genus under Gryllinae. Otte (1994) argued that according to the nomenclatural change proposed by Gorochov, the subfamily name should be changed to Sclerogryllinae. Otte used the name Sclerogryllinae for the first time, and this was followed by Storozhenko et al. (2015).

Recently, Yu et al. (2022) published a complete mitochondrial genome of cricket Sclerogryllus punctatus. By phylogenetic analysis, they verified that Sclerogryllus was grouped within the Gryllinae clade. Therefore, Sclerogryllinae should be treated as a synonym of Gryllinae, and Gorochov’s tribe Sclerogryllini under Gryllinae is recommended rather than a different subfamily from field crickets.

Sclerogryllini is a monogeneric tribe, with five species distributed in Asia. Rhabdotogryllus caraboides Chopard, 1954 from Guinea (Africa), is only known from its holotype female, and no additional records have been reported since its description. R. caraboides is superficially similar to Sclerogryllus females, but possessing more conspicuous dorsal spurs on the hind tibia. Thus, the homology of Rhabdotogryllus and Sclerogryllus is still a question, and Sclerogryllini probably only occurs in Asia. Here, we propose a new fossil subtribe that more closely resembles extant Sclerogryllini species in morphology than any other tribal taxon of field crickets. Additionally, a key to separate the taxa of the tribe is provided.