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The Cupedidae are a small family of beetles, notable for the square pattern of "windows" on their elytra, which give the family their common name of reticulated beetles.
The soldier beetles (Cantharidae) are relatively soft-bodied, straight-sided beetles. They are cosmopolitan in distribution. One of the first described species has a color pattern reminiscent of the red coats of early British soldiers, hence the common name. They are also known commonly as leatherwings because of their soft elytra.
The bean weevils or seed beetles are a subfamily (Bruchinae) of beetles, now placed in the family Chrysomelidae, though they have historically been treated as a separate family. They are granivores, and typically infest various kinds of seeds or beans, living most of their lives inside a single seed. The subfamily includes about 1,650 species and are found worldwide.
Trogidae, sometimes called hide beetles, is a family of beetles with a distinctive warty or bumpy appearance. Found worldwide, the family includes about 300 species contained in four or five genera.
The hymenopteran family Platygastridae is a large group of exclusively parasitoid wasps, mostly very small (1–2 mm), black, and shining, with geniculate (elbowed) antennae that have an eight-segmented flagellum. The wings sometimes lack venation, though they may have slight fringes of setae.
The family Oedemeridae is a cosmopolitan group of beetles commonly known as false blister beetles, though some recent authors have coined the name pollen-feeding beetles. There are some 100 genera and 1,500 species in the family, mostly associated with rotting wood as larvae, though adults are quite common on flowers. The family was erected by Pierre André Latreille in 1810.
Ripiphoridae is a cosmopolitan family of some 450 described species of beetles sometimes called "wedge-shaped beetles". Ripiphoridae are unusual among beetle families in that many species are hypermetamorphic parasitoids, an attribute that they share with the Meloidae. Members of the family differ in their choice of hosts, but most attack various species of bees or wasps, while some others attack cockroaches or beetles. Many species of Ripiphoridae have abbreviated elytra, and flabellate or pectinate antennae.
The Stephanidae, sometimes called crown wasps, are a family of parasitoid wasps. They are the only living members of the superfamily Stephanoidea. Stephanidae has at least 345 living species in 11 genera. The family is considered cosmopolitan in distribution, with the highest species concentrations in subtropical and moderate climate zones. Stephanidae also contain four extinct genera described from both compression fossils and inclusions in amber.
Cydnidae are a family of shield bugs, known by common names including burrowing bugs or burrower bugs.
The Bostrichidae are a family of beetles with more than 700 described species. They are commonly called auger beetles, false powderpost beetles, or horned powderpost beetles. The head of most auger beetles cannot be seen from above, as it is downwardly directed and hidden by the thorax. Exceptions are the powderpost beetles, and members of the subfamily Psoinae.
Piesmatidae is a small family of true bugs, commonly called ash-grey leaf bugs. The Piesmatidae are distributed mostly in the temperate Northern Hemisphere, with some occurring in Africa, Australia and South America. A common species found throughout the Americas is Piesma cinereum.
Ant nest beetles or paussines, some members of which are known also as flanged bombardier beetles, are a large subfamily within the ground beetles (Carabidae).The tribes Metriini, Ozaenini, Paussini and Protopaussini are included in the subfamily.
The Ommatidae are a family of beetles in the suborder Archostemata. The Ommatidae are considered the extant beetle family that has most ancestral characteristics. There are only seven extant species, confined to Australia and South America. However, the geographical distribution was much wider during the Mesozoic spanning across Eurasia and Australia, suggesting that they were widespread on Pangea. So far, over 26 extinct genera containing over 170 species of these beetles have been described. Three extant genera have been assigned to this family: Omma,Tetraphalerus and Beutelius. The family is considered to be a subfamily of Cupedidae by some authors, but have been found to be more closely related to Micromalthidae in molecular phylogenies. A close relationship with Micromalthidae is supported by several morphological characters, including those of the mandibles and male genitalia. Due to their rarity, their ecology is obscure, it is likely that their larvae feed on deadwood.
Boganiidae is a family of beetles, in the suborder Polyphaga. Members of the family are found in southern Africa, Australia and New Caledonia. Adults and larvae are pollenivorous, feeding on the pollen of cycads and Myrtaceae, Meliaceae, Cunoniaceae and Elaeocarpaceae angiosperms. Metacucujus and Paracucujus act as pollinators for cycads Encephalartos and Macrozamia respectively. This association with cycads goes back to at least the Mid-Cretaceous, with an extinct form being found with preserved cycad pollen in 99 million year old Burmese amber.
Sphindidae is a family of beetles, in the suborder Polyphaga. They are also known as slime mold beetles due to their exclusive feeding on slime molds during adult and larval stages, other aspects of their life history are obscure. Palaeontological discoveries since 2015 have added to the geologic history of Sphindidae, including the discovery of Libanopsis, placed in the extinct subfamily Libanopsinae.
The Brachypsectridae are a family of beetles commonly known as the Texas beetles. There are only two extant genera, Brachypsectra and Asiopsectra. The type species, Brachypsectra fulva, occurs in North America. Other species in the genus have a cosmopolitan distribution. Two other extant and fossil species have been described from the Dominican Republic. While formerly considered monogeneric, in 2016 Asiopsectra was described from specimens found in Iran and Tajikistan. Two extinct genera, Vetubrachypsectra and Hongipsectra, known from adults, and a larval genus, Cretopsectra are known from Cenomanian aged Burmese amber.
2019 in paleoentomology is a list of new fossil insect taxa that were described during the year 2019, as well as other significant discoveries and events related to paleoentomology that were scheduled to occur during the year.
Discoscapa apicula is an extinct species of crabronid wasp, formerly considered one of the two oldest-known species of bees. The species was described from an amber inclusion in Burmese Amber in 2020 by George Poinar Jr., a zoologist at Oregon State University. The fossil was found in a mine in the Hukawng Valley of northern Myanmar and is believed to date from the Cretaceous Period, 100 million years ago, the same age as Melittosphex burmensis, likewise previously considered the oldest known bee species; as it comes from the same amber deposit, these two specimens are considered to be the same approximate age. More recent research has concluded that D. apicula is a wasp belonging to the subfamily Crabroninae, placed in its own tribe, Discoscapini.
2020 in paleoentomology is a list of new fossil insect taxa that were described during the year 2020, as well as other significant discoveries and events related to paleoentomology that were scheduled to occur during the year.
Burmese amber is fossil resin dating to the early Late Cretaceous Cenomanian age recovered from deposits in the Hukawng Valley of northern Myanmar. It is known for being one of the most diverse Cretaceous age amber paleobiotas, containing rich arthropod fossils, along with uncommon vertebrate fossils and even rare marine inclusions. A mostly complete list of all taxa described up until 2018 can be found in Ross 2018; its supplement Ross 2019b covers most of 2019.
References
- ↑ Tihelka, Erik; Huang, Diying; Cai, Chenyang (2019-07-15). "A new subfamily of hide beetles from the Cretaceous of northern Myanmar (Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea: Trogidae)". Historical Biology. 33 (4): 506–513. doi:10.1080/08912963.2019.1641705. ISSN 0891-2963. S2CID 202865768.
- ↑ "Kresnikus". BioLib.