Chironomus

Chironomus is a genus of nonbiting midges in the subfamily Chironominae of the bloodworm family, Chironomidae, containing several cryptic species that can only be distinguished by experts based on the characteristics of their giant chromosomes.

Chironomus

Uncredited · Attribution · 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
Sits inside
ChironominiPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Insecta

Time the record covers

At least 45 million years on record.

The record covers at least 45.9 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 51.1 Mya to 0 Mya.

Eocene — about 35 of 71 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 15 of 71 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 5 of 71 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 4 of 71 occurrencesPleistocene — about 7 of 71 occurrences52–50 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences50–49 Mya — about 1 occurrence49–47 Mya — about 1 occurrence47–45 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences38–36 Mya — about 8 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 15 occurrences35–33 Mya — about 8 occurrences33–31 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences31–30 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences30–28 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences28–26 Mya — about 4 occurrences26–24 Mya — about 5 occurrences24–23 Mya — about 4 occurrences23–21 Mya — about 1 occurrence21–19 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences14–12 Mya — about 2 occurrences12–10 Mya — about 1 occurrence7.0–5.2 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences5.2–3.5 Mya — about 2 occurrences3.5–1.7 Mya — about 5 occurrences1.7–0 Mya — about 9 occurrences45.9 Mya11.7 ka52 Mya0 Mya

71 occurrences of Chironomus 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

71 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

11 formations

Florissant — 38.92°N, 105.28°WRott — 50.75°N, 7.26°EGreen River — 39.00°N, 108.00°WGreen River — 41.56°N, 109.55°WGreen River — 41.55°N, 109.51°WUpper Freshwater-Molasse — 47.67°N, 8.93°ENiveau du gypse d'Aix — 43.52°N, 5.45°ECampagne-Calavon — 43.85°N, 5.58°EKap København — 82.45°N, 24.10°WFoulden Hills Diatomite — 45.53°S, 170.22°ESalt — 47.69°N, 7.53°ERita Blanca — 35.71°N, 102.45°WNagano — 31.88°N, 130.34°E

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The named rock units Chironomus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 30 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Chironomus and its relatives

Eocene

Where Chironomus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

2,647 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 35 sites for Chironomus, and this reads all of them. 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

25 references

Each of the 71 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. 13 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 Chironomus

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

No 3D scan of Chironomus 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

What may have been alongside itChironomini through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Meigen 1803