A water bug from the Jurassic period carried its eggs on one leg until they hatched. (Image credit: Courtesy of Diying Huang)
Live Science has a story about a Jurassic insect discovery. Fossils show that a water bug that lived about 160 million years ago carried its eggs on its legs. The fossils were discovered in the Haifanggou Formation, a fossil-filled rock deposit near the village of Daohugou in northeastern China. A paper in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences has the details.
In a study published Wednesday (July 13) in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences(opens in new tab), researchers analyzed nearly 160 fossilized Karataviella popovi, an extinct species of water bug with oar-like hind legs. The fossils — which the study authors called "exceptional" — are 163.5 million years old, meaning they date to the middle of the Jurassic period (201.3 million to 145.5 million years ago).
Among these fossils, the team identified 30 adult female specimens with a cluster of eggs anchored to their left "mesotibia," the middle leg in their trio of left-side legs. The densely-packed eggs were arranged in five or six staggered rows, with six to seven eggs per row, each attached via a short "egg stalk." Each egg measures about 0.04 to 0.05 inches (1.14 to 1.20 millimeters) across — a fairly hefty size considering that K. popovi adults only measure roughly 0.5 inches (12.7 mm) long.
