Researchers from McGill University and the University of Gdansk have discovered a species of hairy cicada they call Maculaferrum blaisi, based on a fossilized wing found at the Redmond Formation in Labrador, Canada, they reported February 20 in Acta Palaeontologica Polonica.
“The find is exciting because it represents the oldest, diverse insect locality in Canada,” says coauthor Hans Larsson, a paleontologist at McGill University, in a press release. “It’s also from an exciting time during an evolutionary explosion of flowering plants and pollinating insects, that evolved into the terrestrial ecosystems of today.”
A.V. Demers-Potvin et al., “First North American occurrence of hairy cicadas discovered in the Cenomanian (Late Cretaceous) of Labrador, Canada,” Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, doi:10/4202/app.00669.2019, 2020.
Amy Schleunes is an intern at The Scientist. Email her at aschleunes@the-scientist.com.
