New sawflies from the mid-Cretaceous Myanmar amber (Insecta: Hymenoptera: Syspastoxyelidae)

Abstract

ABSTRACT Many insects have been described from the mid-Cretaceous Myanmar (Burmese) amber in recent years, including about 50 families of wasps. However, only two species of sawfly, Syspastoxyela rhaphidia and Striaexyela longicornis (Syspastoxyelidae), have been described in Myanmar amber, in contrast to more than 100 species of sawflies from the Mesozoic of Kazakhstan and China. Herein, we describe three new taxa of sawflies, Deltoxyela engeli gen. et sp. nov., Syspastoxyela pinguis sp. nov. and Syspastoxyela simpla sp. nov., based on six amber pieces with 21 specimens of sawflies from the mid-Cretaceous Myanmar amber. The new findings suggest that syspastoxyelids were speciose and prosperous in the ecosystem, even though only one family of sawflies, Syspastoxyelidae, has been reported hitherto.