New data on Cretaceous plants’ pollinating insects from 105 million years ago

In the Cretaceous, about 105 million years ago, there were no ants, bees or proboscis butterflies, and most of the terrestrial ecosystems were dominated by non-flowering plants (gymnosperms). These plants were mainly conifers, and among them were the cycads, ginkgoes and the extinct benettitales, which are now generally pollinated by the wind (anemophily or wind pollination). During the mid-Cretaceous, the transition towards current terrestrial landscapes dominated by flowering plants or angiosperms took place: this was a new lineage of fast-growing plants which were very adaptable to all types of environments.

This found species (Darwinylus marcosi) opens a new frontier for the study of pollination in forest ecosystems that were dominated by dinosaurs. “At first, we thought that this beetle group had a pollinating function among the first angiosperms that developed over the Cretaceous, since there is pollen and angiosperms’ leaves in the same levels of amber. However, the fact that the related pollen grains were from a gymnosperm was a big surprise for the research team” highlights Professor Xavier Delcòs, from the Faculty of Earth Sciences and the Biodiversity Research Institute (IRBio) of the University of Barcelona.   

The new study, published in the journal Current Biology, opens new frontiers to the study of pollination in the middle Cretaceous (image: Enrique Peñalver, IGME)

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