The Phasmatodea, often known as the Phasmida or walkingstick insects, are leaf insects. All the species are stick-shaped, while several tropical species resemble leaves (Family Timemidae). The Phasmatodea are also known as walking sticks, stick animals, bug sticks, stick insects, and stick bugs. Other names for them include Devil’s darning needles.
Phasmatodeans are mostly nocturnal creatures that mimic various plant parts, such as twigs, bark, and living or dead leaves, in extreme cases of masquerade crypsis. The vast majority of surviving phasmatodeans have long, slender legs and an extended tubular body, giving them a stick-like appearance. Less frequently, taxa display a more robust body with expansions in the shape of leaves, yet, as recently published fossils imply, mimicry of leaves may have developed before that of twigs (Wang et al. 2014). Through specific behaviours like catalepsy (adapted stillness) and imitating a leaf swinging in the breeze during the day, several types of plant mimicry are brought to perfection (Bedford 1978, Bian et al. 2016). Phasmatodeans can deceive visually seeking predators with this astonishing sort of mimicry, and even their eggs exhibit it. The remarkably hard-shelled and intricately sculpted capsules closely resemble plant seeds (Bedford 1978, Sellick 1997, Goldberg et al. 2015).