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Issue: Vol. 5 No. 5: September 2022
Type: Article
Published: 2022-09-22
DOI: 10.11646/palaeoentomology.5.5.7
Page range: 461–467
Abstract views: 357
PDF downloaded: 18

A review of the Cretaceous genus Eltxo (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) with description of the new species Eltxo grimaldii from El Soplao amber

Instituto Geológico y Minero de España (IGME), CSIC, C/ Cirilo Amorós 42, 46004 Valencia, Spain
Departamento de Biodiversidad, Ecología y Evolución, Facultad de Biología, Universidad Complutense; Madrid, Spain
Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité (ISYEB) Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, EPHE, Université des Antilles, CP50, 57 rue Cuvier 75005 Paris, France
Diptera Cecidomyiidae taxonomy new taxon wing venation Albian Spain

Abstract

A new species, Eltxo grimaldii sp. nov., is described from Spanish Lower Cretaceous (middle Albian) amber from El Soplao, based on a single female. The new species is compared with the other only known species of the genus, Eltxo cretaceus Arillo & Nel, 2000, based on a single male specimen also found in Spanish amber, but slightly younger (Peñacerrada I amber; upper Albian). The holotype of E. cretaceus is reviewed and its description corrected and expanded, providing the first micrographs of its anatomical features. The holotype of the new fossil species is the only female specimen known of the cecidomyiid tribe Amediini Jaschhof, 2021, a tribe recently described after changes of taxonomic attribution of the genus Eltxo during the last 20 years.

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