• Redfox8@mander.xyz
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    1 day ago

    Many species of butterlies and moths eat honeydew, aka aphid poop, so no nectar needed. Also the larvae do the bulk of the eating. Imagos of lepidoptera only need to survive not grow so food requirements are fairly low.

    • ryedaft@sh.itjust.works
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      1 day ago

      Oldest known butterfly fossils are 56 million years old. Moths are much older. The picture is of butterflies but the fossils are going to be moths.

      • Evil_Shrubbery@lemm.ee
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        4 hours ago

        Yeah, but 230 million years is/would be new info & older than thought.

        Edit: o shit … with wings.
        sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0895981125002469

        This specimen comes from a communal latrine in the lower Carnian deposits (∼236 Ma) of the Chañares Formation, La Rioja Province, northwestern Argentina. The tiny fossil scales are hollow and ornamented, which is a synapomorphy of Lepidoptera and suggests that they could belong to this group. If this is the case, the Chañares scales would partially fill the temporal mismatch between phylogenomic date and the fossil evidence of butterflies and moths because they preceded the previously oldest lepidopteran record by c. 35 million years. Moreover, the scales have a combination of features present in early diverging glossatan lepidopterans. The inclusion of the temporal data provided by the Chañares scales into an updated temporal calibration of lepidopteran phylogeny shows that the proboscis, a key evolutionary novelty for the group (Glossata), evolved between c. 260–244 Ma. Thus, the proboscis-bearing lepidopterans would be part of the repertory of new plants and animals that diversified during the aftermath of the EPME.

  • drolex@sopuli.xyz
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    1 day ago

    What did they eat? Or was it only caterpillars eating and butterflies fucking everywhere? Man the Permian was freaky.

    Also why are they not 2 metres wide? Disappointing.