Changes to the Fossil Record of Insects through Fifteen Years of Discovery

The first and last occurrences of hexapod families in the fossil record are compiled from publications up to end-2009. The major features of these data are compared with those of previous datasets (1993 and 1994). About a third of families (>400) are new to the fossil record since 1994, over half of the earlier, existing families have experienced changes in their known stratigraphic range and only about ten percent have unchanged ranges. Despite these significant additions to knowledge, the broad pattern of described richness through time remains similar, with described richness increasing steadily through geological history and a shift in dominant taxa, from Palaeoptera and Polyneoptera to Paraneoptera and Holometabola, after the Palaeozoic. However, after detrending, described richness is not well correlated with the earlier datasets, indicating significant changes in shorter-term patterns. There is reduced Palaeozoic richness, peaking at a different time, and a less pronounced Permian decline. A pronounced Triassic peak and decline is shown, and the plateau from the mid Early Cretaceous to the end of the period remains, albeit at substantially higher richness compared to earlier datasets. Origination and extinction rates are broadly similar to before, with a broad decline in both through time but episodic peaks, including end-Permian turnover. Origination more consistently exceeds extinction compared to previous datasets and exceptions are mainly in the Palaeozoic. These changes suggest that some inferences about causal mechanisms in insect macroevolution are likely to differ as well

Placocystella in the Early Devonian (Lochkovian) of central Victoria

The South African allanicytidiid mitrate carpoid Placocystella africana (Reed) is recorded for the first time from Australasia having been collected from a Lochkovian bed of the Humevale Formation at Mooroolbark in eastern Melbourne. The Southern Hemisphere Allanicytidiidae incorporating five monospecific genera in Brazil, South Africa, Tasmania, Victoria and New Zealand is now known to have a species in common between South Africa and Victoria. The previously suggested synonymy of these five is revised to accept Placocystella, Tasmanicytidium, Allanicytidium and Australocystis (but not Notocarpos) as synonymous so that the family contains Placocystella with four species and monospecific Notocarpos

A Tremadocian asterozoan from Tasmania and a late Llandovery edrioasteroid from Victoria

Jell, P.A., 2014. A Tremadocian asterozoan from Tasmania and a late Llandovery edrioasteroid from Victoria. Alcheringa 38, 528-540. ISSN 0311-5518.An asterozoan, Maydena roadsidensis gen. et sp. nov., is described from the mid-Tremadocian (La1b Zone) Florentine Valley Formation in southwestern Tasmania and is the oldest known asterozoan in the world. Although only a single, largely dissociated, specimen is available, enough is preserved to recognize distinctive ambulacral plates similar to those of Archegonaster Jaekel from the Llanvirn of the Czech Republic. Reciprocodiscus transambus n. gen., n. sp. is an isorophid edrioasteroid from the uppermost late Llandovery Springfield Formation exposed in the bed of Deep Creek, near Springfield, 65km north northwest of Melbourne. It occurs with a low-diversity trilobite fauna indicating a deepwater, subphotic environment. This edrioasteroid has in each ambulacrum a single series of floor plates that are not visible on the oral surface, indicating its isorophid affinity and retains certain apparently primitive features that are not seen in post-Cambrian edrioasteroids, such as the very large plates of the marginal circlet, plated aboral surface and ambulacral tips extending onto the marginal circlet plates

Penarosa netenta, a new Middle Cambrian trilobite from northwestern Queensland

Volume: 18Start Page: 119End Page: 12

Australian Cretaceous cnidaria and porifera

Australian Cretaceous sponge and coral faunas are reviewed and increased with new discoveries. The largest new fauna described, from the very thin Maastrichtian Miria Formation, an uncemented chalky marl, in the Carnarvon Basin, Western Australia, includes a poriferan, Ventriculites sp., the hydrozoans, Stylaster cretaceous sp. nov. and Astya nielseni Wells, 1977 originally described from the Eocene of Tonga and the scleractinian corals Smilotrochus carnarvonensis sp. nov., Conotrochus giraliensis sp. nov., Parasmilia cyensis sp. nov., Palaeopsammia cardabiaensis sp. nov., Flabellum miriaensis sp. nov., Ballanophyllia acostae sp. nov., representatives of five genera left in open nomenclature and Caryophyllia arcotensis (Forbes, 1846), originally described from south India. The Santonian Gingin Chalk, in the northern Perth Basin, Western Australia has yielded the scleractinian corals Ceratotrochus ginginensis (Etheridge 1913), originally assigned to Coelosmilia and Caryophyllia arcotensis (Forbes, 1846), holdfast structures that probably supported octocorals and the poriferans, Peronidella(?) globosa (Etheridge 1913) and Pachyteichisma corrugatus sp. nov. Mckenziephyllia accordensis gen. et sp. nov. is described as the first scleractinian coral (Faviidae) from the Eromanga Basin. It comes from the Albian Allaru Formation in the Barcaldine district of central Queensland. Purisiphonia clarkei Bowerbank, 1869 is noted from the Aptian Wallumbilla Formation as the only known poriferan in the Surat and Eromanga basins

Late Triassic homopterous nymph from Dinmore, Ipswich Basin

Volume: 33Start Page: 360End Page: 36

Carboniferous platyceratid gastropods from Western Australia and a possible alternative lifestyle adaptation

Cook, A.G. & Jell, P.A., September 2015. Carboniferous platyceratid gastropods from Western Australia and a possible alternative lifestyle adaptation. Alcheringa 40, XX–XX. ISSN 0311-5518 Platyceratid gastropods, common and in many cases abundant as elements of middle Palaeozoic gastropod faunas worldwide, are rare or absent in Australian Devonian faunas. In Australia, the earliest abundant platyceratids occur in the Lower Carboniferous (Tournaisian) echinoderm-rich Septimus Limestone and Enga Sandstone in the Bonaparte Gulf Basin, Western Australia. Four taxa, each with significant morphological plasticity, are recognized. In Platyceras (Platyceras) tubulosus (de Koninck, 1883), three rows of long radially arranged spines and common pentameral symmetry of re-entrants on the aperture suggest an alternative possibility that a relationship between echinoderms and platyceratids developed, and that this may be with archaeocidaroids that are commonly preserved with the gastropods. Similarly in the singly spinose Platyceras (Platyceras) emmemmjae sp. nov., re-entrants suggest an echinoderm relationship. It is proposed that an echinoderm–Platyceras relationship possibly developed in Australia only after a suitable echinoid host had evolved allowing an alternative way for a gameto- or coprophagous habit to be exploited fully

Edwa maryae gen. et sp. nov. in the Norian Blackstone Formation of the Ipswich Basin—the first Triassic spider (Mygalomorphae) from Australia

RAVEN, R.J., JELL, P.A. & KNEZOUR, R.A., 9.02.2015. Edwa maryae gen. et sp. nov. in the Norian Blackstone Formation of the Ipswich Basin—the first Triassic spider (Mygalomorphae) from Australia. Alcheringa 39, 000–000. ISSN 0311-5518Edwa maryae gen. et sp. nov. is described as the first fossil diplurid mygalomorph from Australia and the fourth Triassic mygalomorph worldwide. Other fossil diplurids are reviewed: Edwa gen. nov. is included in the Masteriinae; Cretadiplura Selden, Dinodiplura Selden are transferred to the Euagrinae along with Seldischnoplura seldeni gen. et sp. nov., which had been originally assigned to Dinodiplura ambulacra Selden.Robert J. Raven [[email protected]] Queensland Museum, GPO Box 3300, South Brisbane, Queensland, 4101, Australia; Peter A. Jell [[email protected]] School of Earth Sciences, University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, 4072, Australia; Robert A. Knezour [[email protected]] 14 Glebe Road, Newtown, Queensland, 4305, Australia

Mecochirus Germar (Decapoda: Glypheoidea) in the Lower Cretaceous of Queensland

JELL, P.A., WOODS, J.T. & COOK, A.G., May 2017. Mecochirus Germar (Decapoda: Glypheoidea) in the Lower Cretaceous of Queensland. Alcheringa 41, 514–523 ISSN 0311-5518. Three new species of glypheoid decapod crustaceans, Mecochirus mcclymontorum, M. bartholomaii and M. lanceolatus, are described from the late Aptian of the Eromanga, Carpentaria and Maryborough basins, respectively. The first two occur in the Doncaster Member of the Wallumbilla Formation and the last in the Maryborough Formation. This is the first record of Mecochirus Germar, 1827 or the Mecochiridae Van Straelen, 1925 in Australia and one of only a few Cretaceous occurrences of this largely Jurassic genus