The bees of Early Eocene Cambay amber (Hymenoptera: Apidae)
Author
Engel, Michael S.
Division of Entomology, Natural History Museum, and Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, 1501 Crestline Drive - Suite 140, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA (msengel @ ku. edu; jaimeortega @ ku. edu). & Division of Invertebrate Zoology, American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West
Author
Ortega-Blanco, Jaime
Division of Entomology, Natural History Museum, and Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, 1501 Crestline Drive - Suite 140, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA (msengel @ ku. edu; jaimeortega @ ku. edu).
Author
Nascimbene, Paul C.
Division of Invertebrate Zoology, American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West
Author
Singh, Hukam
Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, 53 University Road, Lucknow 226 007, India (hukams @ gmail. com).
text
Journal of Melittology
2013
2013-12-17
2013
25
1
12
https://doi.org/10.17161/jom.v0i25.4659
journal article
302762
10.17161/jom.v0i25.4659
a954f134-084d-41e5-8a41-61af66929a3b
2325-4467
13736871
urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:9AFCD1E3-42B6-4CB3-8321-35C60579289C
Protobombus
? species indeterminate
MATERIAL:
AMNH
Tad-41-A;
India
:
Gujurat
,
Tadkeshwar
lignite mine; Cambay
Formation
(Paleo-Eocene),
7–12 January 2009
(
AMNH
)
.
COMMENTS: A poorly preserved female worker (length approximately
7.5 mm
, forewing length approximately
6.7 mm
) putatively of the electrapine genus
Protobombus
Cockerell
as indicated by the shape of the metabasitarsus. The specimen is poorly preserved with the wings outstretched from the body, the mesosoma of which is largely opened ventrally and cleared. The head is also only partially preserved, most of the right side and ventral portions being incomplete at the amber surface, with only the scape, pedicel, and basalmost flagellomeres preserved from the bee’s left side. The wings themselves are also somewhat partial with the anterior-apical portions of the bee’s right forewing missing and the left forewing largely crumpled and obscured. Given the diversity of these bees in the somewhat contemporaneous amber of the Baltic region (
Engel, 2001a
,
2004
) as well as other deposits (
Wappler & Engel, 2003
), it is perhaps not surprising that such similar species should be discovered in
Cambay
amber. It is greatly hoped that more complete and well-preserved specimens will eventually be recovered.