Dung
Midges, Scatopsidae, are minute True Flies, Diptera with a global
distribution. They are a smal group, with about 259 species divided into four subfamilies,
which have a very poor fossil record, but which are thought to be
very ancient for biogeographical reasons. The Subfamily
Psectrosciarinae, for example, is thought to have originated at
latest in the Early Jurassic, but to date has yielded not a single
fossil anywhere in the world.
In a
paper published in the journal Palaeontologica Electronica in July
2016, André Nel and David Coty of the Institut de Systématique,Évolution, Biodiversité at the Muséum national d’Histoirenaturelle describe a Psectrosciarine Dung Midge preserved in amber
from the Salt River Mine locality in Chiappas State, Mexico.
The Salt
River Mine locality is located on the banks of the Salt River about
70 km southeast of Tuxtla Gutierrez and 1 km north of Totolapa. Amber
from this locality has not been accurately dated, but is thought to
be between 25 and 15 million years old, making it Late Oligocene to
Middle Miocene in age.
The Midge
is described as new species, placed in the extant genus Psectrosciara
and given the specific name fossilis,
indicating that it is the first fossil species in the genus
described. The specimen is male, 2.7 mm in length, dark in colour,
has ten antennal segments and a wing legth of 1.44 mm.
Psectrosciara
fossilisin lateral view.
Scale bar is 0.5 mm. Nel & Coty (2016).
See also...
Fossil Bee Flies from the Dominican Republic and North America. Bee Flies, Bombyliidae,
are True Flies, Diptera, specialized for feeding on pollen and
nectar, many of which have evolved long proboscises for nectar
feeding. Many adult Bee Flies resemble Bees in shape and...
Preservation of haemoglobin-derived chemicals in a fossil Mosquito from the Eocene of Montana. The 1993 film Jurassic Park
speculated that Dinosaur DNA might be extracted from blood preserved inside
Mosquitoes, Culcidae, trapped in amber during...
Protoplecid Flies from the Middle Jurassic Daohugou Biota of Inner Mongolia. Protoplecid Flies are a group of True Flies, Diptera,
known from
Jurassic deposits across Eurasia. They are thought to be ancestral to
the
modern Bibionidae (March Flies and Love Bugs) and the group...
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