Early origin of parental care in Mesozoic carrion beetles

Abstract

Significance We report on the unique discovery of Jurassic and Cretaceous carrion beetles (Silphidae) from China and Myanmar, early relatives of one of the most protected of beetle species in North America, and which clearly preserve evidence indicative of complex parental care. This finding represents the earliest evidence of parental care, a behavioral repertoire that is the first step in the development of truly social behavior and one that is intensely studied by ecologists, ethologists, and evolutionary biologists alike. Our fossils clearly span the origins of parent–offspring communication and allow us to provide a robust estimate of the time of origin for this complex behavior.

Total‐evidence approach reveals an extinct lineage of Paederinae rove beetles from Cretaceous Burmese amber

“…They also reported dozens of the Lower Cretaceous to Middle Jurassic Chinese silphid compression fossils and they have also much smaller bodies than the extant carrion beetles (Cai et al . ). Additional examples include the peculiar round fungus beetle genera Colon Herbst, and Colonellus Szymczakowski, (Leiodidae, Coloninae); the fossils of both extant genera from the Burmese amber have significantly small‐sized bodies (Cai & Huang ; Yamamoto & Takahashi ).…”

“…In fact, Cai et al . () reported the extant carrion beetle genus Nicrophorus Fabricius, (Silphidae) from Burmese amber and these fossils are notably smaller than the extant nicrophorines, as much as less than half the length of the extant species. They also reported dozens of the Lower Cretaceous to Middle Jurassic Chinese silphid compression fossils and they have also much smaller bodies than the extant carrion beetles (Cai et al .…”

The peril of dating beetles

“…However, some of the age estimates found in MCK15 are in conflict with current knowledge of the beetle fossil record (e.g. Nikolajev & Ren, ; Pan et al , , Prokin & Ren, ; Fikáček et al , 2012a; Wang et al , , ; Cai et al , , ; Kirejtshuk et al , ; Boucher et al , ) and with other recently published molecular age estimates for some major beetle clades (e.g. Zhang & Zhou, ; Ahrens et al , ; Bloom et al , ; Kergoat et al , ; Kim & Farrell, ; Bocák et al , ; Gunter et al , ).…”

To what extent do new fossil discoveries change our understanding of clade evolution? A cautionary tale from burying beetles (Coleoptera:Nicrophorus)

“…Our study suggests that burying beetles likely originated at the end of the Early Cretaceous in the East Palearctic, which at that time was an isolated continent separated from West Palearctic (by the Turgai Sea) and from Africa and India (by the Tethys Sea) (Seton et al ., ). These results are in agreement with the recent fossil record of the genus discovered in Myanmar (Late Cretaceous, Cenomanian, ~ 93.9–100.5 Mya; Cai et al ., ). The group diversified in East Palearctic during the Cretaceous without expanding to neighbouring regions, except a single dispersal event towards Southeast Asia ( N. distinctus occurs in Sulawesi).…”