Tortoise beetle

The Cassidinae (tortoise and leaf-mining beetles) are, in a broad sense, a subfamily of the leaf beetles, or Chrysomelidae. It includes both the traditional Hispinae (leaf-mining beetles), as well as the former more narrowly defined subfamily Cassidinae (familiar as tortoise beetles) which are now split into several tribes that include the tribe Cassidini, and in all include over 125 genera. The traditional separation of the two groups was based essentially on the habitats of the larvae and the general shapes of the adults. The name Cassidinae for the merged subfamily is considered to have priority.