Archimylacris

Archimylacris
Temporal range: Carboniferous
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Blattoptera
Family: Archimylacridae[1]
Genus: Archimylacris

Archimylacris[2] is an extinct genus of cockroach-like blattopterans, a group of insects ancestral to cockroaches, mantids, and termites.

Archimylacris lived on the warm, swampy forest floors of North America and Europe 300 million years ago, in the Late Carboniferous times. Like modern cockroaches, this insect had a large head shield with long, curved antennae, or feelers, and folded wings. To a modern observer, it would likely appear as a moderate-sized cockroach, with a "tail" (an ovipositors) in the female. Presumably, its habits would be cockroach-like, too, scurrying along the undergrowth eating anything edible, possibly falling prey to labyrinthodont amphibians and very early reptiles. The average length of Archimylacris species was 2–3 cm.[3]

References

  1. ↑ Paleobiology Database
  2. ↑ "Primitive Mylacris (another species of Carboniferous cockroach).
  3. ↑ "A Monograph of the Fossil Insects of the British Coal Measures"
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