New Palaeogene horntail wasps (Hymenoptera, Siricidae) and a discussion of their fossil record

Abstract

The phylogenetic placement of siricid hymenopterans and especially the relationships among Siricidae are not resolved, and are in need of further investigation. The fossil record helps to illuminate the evolutionary history of this group. In this paper, Xoanon? eocenicus sp. nov. is newly described from the Eocene Fossillagerstätte Grube Messel (Germany). Although several characters of the wing venation of this fossil are similar to the extant genus Xoanon, there remain some doubts concerning the generic placement. A newly found fossil is attributed to Urocerus ligniticus (Piton, 1940) from the Paloecene Fossillagerstätte Menat (France) and provides more morphological information on this species. An overview of the fossil record of Siricidae in the strict sense is given and the state of knowledge on the different fossils is reviewed.

Modernisation of the Hymenoptera: ants, bees, wasps, and sawflies of the early Eocene Okanagan Highlands of western North America

“…Siricidae sensu stricto (=Siricinae, sensu Rasnitsyn 1968, i.e ., which includes those currently assigned to the Tremicidae: see also Wedmann 1998; Wedmann et al . 2014; Archibald and Rasnitsyn 2015) has a modest fossil record beginning in the Albian.…”

New early Eocene Siricomorpha (Hymenoptera: Symphyta: Pamphiliidae, Siricidae, Cephidae) from the Okanagan Highlands, western North America

“…The taxonomic position of Y. orthosemos as a member of the superfamily Siricoidea is beyond doubt by its characteristic general appearance, with a long, straight, and strong ovipositor coupled with other distinctive traits of living horntails, that is, a strongly corrugated wing membrane, moderately narrow ribbon-like costal space, reclival Rs base, basal position of the anal loop, and the presence of the metasomal cornus in the female. However, the higher-level systematics within the superfamily is not as clear today as it appeared to be a few decades ago (Rasnitsyn 1969(Rasnitsyn , 1988 due to the accumulation of new described (Wedmann 1998;Zhang 2004a, 2004b;Wedmann et al 2014), re-interpreted (Nel 1988(Nel , 1991Rasnitsyn et al 1998), and undescribed fossils that complicate matters, a development that deserves at least a short discussion.…”

“…Within the Siricidae sensu stricto, the issue of subfamily composition bears some examination. Wedmann et al (2014) recently revisited the significant problem of differentiating the Siricinae and the Tremicinae, its generally accepted subfamily level groups. They demonstrated convincingly the absence of serious reasons to maintain these as distinct taxa, an opinion with which we concur.…”

“…The modest fossil record of the family ( sensu stricto ) was recently summarised by Wedmann et al . (2014, table 1, “crown-group Siricidae”). We emend their list by considering the specimen from the Crato Formation of Brazil (Osten 2007) to belong to the Pseudosiricidae; adding two unnamed specimens from the Early Cretaceous (Albian) of the Emanra Formation in the Russian Federation (Gromov et al .…”

The oldest ‘amphipterygid’ damselfly of tropical affinities in the Paleocene of Menat (Zygoptera: Eucaloptera)

“…Laurent, 1912, Piton, 1940 and fauna (vertebrates and insects) (e. g. Piton 1940, Guth 1962Russel 1967;Matsumoto et al 2013). Since the first extensive study of the insects of Menat by Piton (1940), several works have been done on the entomofauna, mainly undertaken during the last twenty years by our team (e. g. Nel & Roy 1996;Nel et al 1997;Nel & Auvray 2006;Nel 2007, Nel et al 2010, Wedmann et al 2014). …”