Diversification of the greater hydrophilines clade of giant water scavenger beetles dated back to the Middle Eocene (Coleoptera : Hydrophilidae : Hydrophilina)
Martin Fikáček A B E , Sonja Wedmann C and Heiko Schmied DA Department of Entomology, National Museum, Kunratice 1, CZ-14800 Praha 4, Czech Republic.
B Charles University in Prague, Faculty of Science, Department of Zoology, Viničná 7, CZ-12844 Praha 2, Czech Republic.
C Senckenberg Research Institute, Research Station Grube Messel, Markstrasse 35, D-64409 Messel, Germany.
D Steinmann Institute for Geology, Mineralogy, Palaeontology, University of Bonn, Nussallee 8, D-53115 Bonn, Germany.
E Corresponding author. Email: mfikacek@gmail.com
Invertebrate Systematics 24(1) 9-22 https://doi.org/10.1071/IS09042
Submitted: 15 October 2009 Accepted: 8 February 2010 Published: 17 May 2010
Abstract
Fossil representatives of the hydrophilid genera Hydrochara Berthold, 1827, Hydrobiomorpha Blackburn, 1888 and Hydrophilus Geoffroy, 1762 were recorded at the lower Middle Eocene locality Grube Messel in Germany. Four morphospecies were recognised, including Hydrobiomorpha eopalpalis, sp. nov. showing sexually dimorphic maxillary palpomere 2 unknown in any recent or fossil species of the genus. These fossils are the oldest known records of the mentioned genera and indicate a minimum age of 47 million years for the divergence of the Hydrobiomorpha and Hydrophilus clades. Based on these data, we assume that the diversification of the ‘greater hydrophilines’ clade predated the lower Middle Eocene. The fossil record of the subtribe Hydrophilina is briefly reviewed, the reasons of the scarcity or absence of some genera in the fossil record are discussed, and the paleoenviromental significance of the presented fossils is discussed.
Additional keywords: Cenozoic, Europe, fossil record, Hydrophiloidea, Messel.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank G. Gruber and N. Micklich (both Darmstadt) for the loan of hydrophilid fossils from the collection of the HLMD, and J. Rust (Bonn) and S. Schaal, (Frankfurt a. M.) for their support. We are obliged to A. E. Z. Short (University of Kansas, Lawrence) for allowing us to use the data from his phylogenetic analysis of the Hydrophilina (Short 2010) before their publication and for his comments on the manuscript, to M. Pošta for proof-reading of the English text, and to Greg Edgecombe (Natural History Museum, London, UK) and an anonymous reviewer for their suggestions improving the original manuscript. Many thanks go to U. Kiel (Messel) for her efforts preparing the fossils and also to the complete digging team. We appreciate partial funding of this research by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) project No. WE 2942/3–1 (to M.F. and S.W.) and DFG project No. RU 665/3–2 (to S.W. and H.S.). The work of M.F. was supported by grant of the Czech Academy of Sciences (GAAV) KJB301110901, grant of Charles University Grant Agency (GAUK) 18307/2007/B-Bio/PrF, grant of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic MK 00002327201 and grant of the Ministry of Education of the Czech Republic MSM 0021620828. Work of M.F. in Copenhagen was supported by a grant from the European Commission’s (FP 6) Integrated Infrastructure Initiative programme SYNTHESYS (DK-TAF 5400).
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