Dec. 3 () –
New insect fossils newly discovered in New Zealand are so small they can barely be seen by the human eye, but they have been preserved in an “extraordinary” way.
Published in the journal Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments, a new study details the discovery of fossils of iRare whitefly insects in Miocene crater lake sediments in the volcanic area of Dunedin, on the south island of New Zealand.
Adult whiteflies are tiny insects about 3 mm in size, smaller if they are immature. The fossils found in this investigation They measure approximately 1.5 mm by 1.25 mm and have been preserved in the position in which they lived and diedattached to the underside of a fossil leaf.
Black in color and with an oval body, they have some similarities with current whiteflies, such as shape and color, but they differ in that all body segments are clearly defined by deep sutures.
Co-author Dr Uwe Kaulfuss, from the University of Göttingen in Germany and former postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Geology at the University of Otago, said in a statement: “Fossils of adult whitefly insects are not uncommon, but it takes extraordinary circumstances for the pupa (the protective shell from which the insect emerges) to fossilize.”
“About 15 million years ago, the leaf with the pupa must have broken off from a tree, carried by the wind to the small lake and sunk to the deep bottom of the lake to be covered by sediment and fossilized. It must have happened in quick succession, as the tiny insect fossils are exquisitely preserved.
“The new genus and species described in our study reveal for the first time that whitefly insects were an ecological component in ancient South Island forests.”
“The fact that they are still in life position on the blade is incredible and extremely rare. These small fossils are the first of their kind found in New Zealand and only the third example of fossil pupae of this type known worldwide.
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