Raphidiidae, Latreille, 1810

Archibald, S. Bruce & Makarkin, Vladimir N., 2021, Early Eocene snakeflies (Raphidioptera) of western North America from the Okanagan Highlands and Green River Formation, Zootaxa 4951 (1), pp. 41-79 : 66

Raphidiidae genus and species indet.

Fig. 19

Material. F-982, collected by unknown person, unknown date, deposited in the TRU collections. A nearly complete body mostly preserved in dorso-lateral aspect and head in dorsal aspect, with very poorly preserved and fragmentary wings.

Type locality and horizon. Hoodoo Face beds, McAbee, British Columbia, Canada; early Eocene (Ypresian) .

Description. Body approximately 17–18 mm long. Head clearly narrowed posteriorly, 4.2 mm long (including mandibles), 1.9 mm maximum width (dorsal view); mostly appearing black with pale patches (probably post-mortem artefact), anterior part (clypeus, labrum, mandibles) paler, brownish. Mandibles with long sub-apical tooth. Ocelli not detected. Antennae approximately 4 mm long. Prothorax dark brown, relatively short, approximately 3 mm long (0.17–0.18 body length), 0.9 mm maximum width (lateral view); pterothorax dark-brown to black (details not discernible). All legs pale-brownish or dark yellowish, covered with short setae. Most segments of abdomen dark, easily distinguished; genital segments very poorly preserved, not allowing sex determination.

Wings only fragmentarily preserved, venation indistinct.

Remarks. The specimen is assigned to Raphidiidae by its head clearly narrowed posteriorly, while those of Inocelliidae are always broad with mostly parallel sides. It is difficult to determine its generic and species affinity; however, it is probably not conspecific with the other species known from McAbee, Megaraphidia antiquissima , whose prothorax is relatively longer (0.20–0.23 body length). Prothorax length does not, however, separate it from M. ootsa from Driftwood Canyon, which has similar colouration and head shape, but these often occur in extant species of various genera, and so are not especially informative. They do, however, clearly differ in M. hopkinsi from One Mile Creek.

Figures

FIGURE 19. Raphidiidae genus and species indet., F-982. A, specimen as preserved; B, head. Scale bars = 5 mm (A), 1 mm (B).