124 ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS A NEW LACEWING-FLY (NEUROPTERA: PLANIPENNIA) FROM CANADIAN CRETACEOUS AMBER, WITH AN ANALYSIS OF ITS FORE WING CHARACTERS 1 J. Klimaszewski, D.K. McE. Kevan^ ABSTRACT: A new genus and species of lacewing-fly, tentatively assigned to the family Berothidae, preserved in Canadian Upper Cretaceous amber is described and illustrated. This constitutes the first North American fossil record of berothid-like Neuroptera. The fore wing venation of this species is analyzed and compared with those of other groups of recent and fossil Neuroptera. The principal objective of this paper is to describe a previously unknown fossil lacewing-fly and to compare its characters, mostly those of the fore wing, with homologous characters of extant groups. The study is based on an unique fossil specimen preserved in Canadian amber and deposited in the Canadian National Collection of Insects, Ottawa. It was found in July, 1 97 1 , by Dr. J.F. McAlpine in the tailings of an open-pit coal mine near Medicine Hat, Alberta, where amber-bearing coal deposits are overlaid by Upper Cretaceous bentonites estimated as being 72-73 million years old (Richards 1966, McAlpine & Martin 1966). According to McAlpine and Martin (1966) it is very likely that insect specimens collected at the same site existed before the close of the Campanian epoch, some 81 million years ago. The environmental conditions in Upper Cretaceous times in North America generally, and in Alberta in particular, have been briefly summarized by Richards ( 1 966). According to him, "toward the end of the Cretaceous, the climate in North America was becoming more temperate, although evidently still mainly tropical . . . , the great inland sea was being drained by successive uplifts that gave rise to the present Rocky Mountains, and angiosperms were becoming established as the dominant flora ... In southern Alberta the climate was probably still mainly tropical." Since the current climatic conditions in Alberta are drastically different from those prevailing in Upper Cretaceous times, it is not surprising that this and other amber species show a rather remote similarity to those now extant in the region. 1 Received May 13, 1985. Accepted December 16, 1985. ^Lyman Entomological Museum and Research Laboratory, and Department of Entomology, Macdonald College, Campus of McGill University, 21111 Lakeshore Road, Ste.-Anne de Bellevue, Quebec, H9X ICO, Canada. ENT. NEWS 97(3): 124-132, May & June, 1986
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