Apoidea

The superfamily Apoidea is a major group within the Hymenoptera, which includes two traditionally recognized lineages, the "sphecoid" wasps, and the bees. Molecular phylogeny demonstrates that the bees arose from within the traditional "Crabronidae", so that grouping is paraphyletic, and this has led to a reclassification to produce monophyletic families.

Apoidea

Uncredited · Public Domain · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
apoid waspPBDB
Sits inside
AculeataPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Insecta

Time the record covers

At least 140 million years on record.

The record covers at least 141 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 143.1 Mya to 0 Mya.

Late Jurassic — about 0 of 611 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous — about 70 of 611 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 54 of 611 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 5 of 611 occurrencesEocene — about 263 of 611 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 40 of 611 occurrencesMiocene — about 156 of 611 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 3 of 611 occurrencesPleistocene — about 4 of 611 occurrences146–141 Mya — about 3 occurrences141–136 Mya — about 1 occurrence136–131 Mya — about 2 occurrences131–127 Mya — about 6 occurrences127–122 Mya — about 20 occurrences122–117 Mya — about 20 occurrences117–112 Mya — about 16 occurrences112–107 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences107–102 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences102–97 Mya — about 23 occurrences97–92 Mya — about 26 occurrences92–88 Mya — about 2 occurrences88–83 Mya — about 1 occurrence83–78 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences78–73 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences73–68 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences68–63 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences63–58 Mya — about 5 occurrences58–54 Mya — about 8 occurrences54–49 Mya — about 16 occurrences49–44 Mya — about 15 occurrences44–39 Mya — about 9 occurrences39–34 Mya — about 206 occurrences34–29 Mya — about 16 occurrences29–24 Mya — about 24 occurrences24–19 Mya — about 28 occurrences19–15 Mya — about 71 occurrences15–9.7 Mya — about 50 occurrences9.7–4.9 Mya — about 17 occurrences4.9–0 Mya — about 23 occurrences141 Mya11.7 ka146 Mya0 Mya

611 occurrences of Apoidea on record, most of them in the Eocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

611 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

46 formations

Florissant — 38.92°N, 105.28°WFlorissant — 38.93°N, 105.24°WUpper Freshwater-Molasse — 47.67°N, 8.93°ERandeck Maar — 48.57°N, 9.53°EShanwang — 36.55°N, 118.71°EWeald Clay — 52.72°N, 1.44°WWeald Clay — 51.13°N, 0.33°WWeald Clay — 51.15°N, 0.47°WEifel — 50.11°N, 6.82°ERott — 50.75°N, 7.26°ERott — 50.75°N, 7.26°ERott — 50.59°N, 7.24°EZaza — 53.30°N, 112.09°ECrato — 7.13°S, 39.70°WMessel — 49.93°N, 8.75°EMenat — 46.10°N, 2.90°Ela Pedrera de Rubies — 42.01°N, 0.96°ENiveau du gypse d'Aix — 43.52°N, 5.45°ELa Pedrera de Rúbies — 42.02°N, 0.89°EBouldnor — 50.74°N, 1.36°WLaiyang — 36.78°N, 120.67°ELaiyang — 36.76°N, 120.64°ELaiyang — 37.03°N, 120.79°ECampagne-Calavon — 43.85°N, 5.58°EDzun-Bain — 45.45°N, 99.13°ELulworth — 50.60°N, 1.95°WLulworth — 50.60°N, 1.95°WLulworth — 51.08°N, 1.98°WKlondike Mountain — 48.66°N, 118.75°WSinuiju — 40.08°N, 124.42°EYixian — 41.15°N, 117.96°EYixian — 41.62°N, 120.83°EYixian — 41.54°N, 118.92°ELatah — 46.53°N, 116.79°WLatah — 47.61°N, 117.43°WArgiles d'lignite du Soissonnais — 49.33°N, 2.66°E

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The named rock units Apoidea has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 22 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 344 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Apoidea and its relatives

Eocene

Where Apoidea and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

7,948 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 240 sites for Apoidea, and this reads all of them. Of that, one read hit the database's own return limit, so every count below is a floor rather than a total. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

219 references

Each of the 611 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 207 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Apoidea

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Apoidea was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Latreille 1802