Fossil Insect Collaborative-Digitization Project

Ancient Insect Ge****ls Found in 50-Million-Year-Old Fossil A newly discovered assassin bug features a well-preserved phallus the size of a grain of rice

Greetings, fossil insect enthusiasts! 🐛 The LACM Invertebrate Paleontology dataset on GBIF now includes some unusually preserved "glass" arthropods from the Southern California desert.

These specimens were silicified in ancient lake sediments that are now part of the Miocene Barstow Formation. Eventually, they were extracted from concretions using dilute acid and later digitized as part of the Fossil Insect Collaborative TCN. This particular collection was a gift of John Jenkins (LACMIP loc. 17898).

Want to see more? All records from this collection can be recalled by: 1) visiting the LACMIP dataset on GBIF: https://doi.org/10.15468/6nxzen and 2) free text searching for "17898". To view thumbnails, choose "Gallery" view. And voilà, there you have some fossil insects--and friends--to complete this .

Fossils of L.A.