Discovered grasshoppers live 20 million years ago

An ancient grasshopper species that humans never knew before was discovered in a piece of hard amber. Another rare detail is that this piece of amber was found more than half a century ago in the Dominican Republic.

At that time, people collected hundreds of pieces of amber and placed them in a storage area of ​​the laboratory. In it, the piece of amber containing rare and precious objects is located at the bottom.

Photo: natureworldnews

Researchers from the University of Illinois (USA) have recently rearranged the amber archives and suddenly found a rare specimen contained inside a grasshopper that lived about 20 million years ago.

This new grasshopper is scientifically named Electrotettix attenboroughi . It has a small pair of wings but it cannot fly, which may represent the process of stopping evolution.

UPI news agency quoted the University of Illinois scientist Sam Head as saying that the grasshopper specimens in amber are rare, more specifically that the samples are well preserved.

Other pieces of amber that have been found to "confine" species such as bees, ants, mosquitoes, plant traces . provide clues to the habitat they once developed in ancient times.

This finding is published in an article published in ZooKeys magazine.