Cixiidae
The Cixiidae are a family of fulgoroid insects, one of many families commonly known as planthoppers, distributed worldwide and comprising more than 2,000 species from over 150 genera.

James K. Lindsey · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
- cixiid planthopperPBDB
- Sits inside
- DelphacoideaPBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Insecta
Time the record covers
At least 121 million years on record.
The record covers at least 121.4 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 125.77 Mya to 0 Mya.
62 occurrences of Cixiidae 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
62 occurrencesThese 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
13 formations
- Bouldnor Formation · Solent Group18
- Argiles d'lignite du Soissonnais Formation3
- Rott Formation3
- Crato Formation · Santana Group2
- Mazantic Shale Formation · Simojovel Group2
- Tranquille Formation · Kamloops Group1
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The named rock units Cixiidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 26 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Cixiidae and its relatives
EoceneWhere Cixiidae and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.
Found in the same rock
3,223 taxa- Attagenus hoffeinsorum4 sites
- Balticoroma serafinorum4 sites
- Beraeodes vectensis4 sites
- Cheilotrichia (Empeda) pawlowskii4 sites
- Cicadellidae4 sites
- Dicranomyia (Dicranomyia) lobata4 sites
- Electrolotis hoffeinsorum4 sites
- Elephantomyia (Elephantomyia) longirostris4 sites
- Gymnastes (Paragymnastes) fasciatipennis4 sites
- Hersiliidae4 sites
- Ichneumonidae4 sites
- Lepidoptera4 sites
- Limnophila (Limnophila) deleta4 sites
- Mizalia4 sites
- Mycetophilidae4 sites
- Pericoma primaeva4 sites
- Protoorthobula bifida4 sites
- Sylvicola hooleyi4 sites
- Wightipsocus intasi4 sites
- Ablator triguttatus3 sites
- Aeolothrips jarzembowskii3 sites
- Anglogomphaeschna eocenica3 sites
- Aphidoidea3 sites
- Awightipsocus jarzembowskii3 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 37 sites for Cixiidae, 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
31 references- Aphids, true hoppers, jumping plant-lice, scale insects, true bugs and whiteflies (Insecta: Hemiptera) from the Insect Limestone (latest Eocene) of the Isle of Wight, UK19
- New Mnemosynini taxa (Hemiptera, Fulgoromorpha: Cixiidae) from the Palaeogene of France with notes on their early association with host plants4
- Acrotiarini trib. nov., in the Cixiidae (Insecta, Hemiptera, Fulgoromorpha) from mid-Cretaceous amber of northern Myanmar, with new insights in the classification of the family3
- First fossil Pentastirini from Eocene Baltic amber (Hemiptera: Fulgoromorpha: Cixiidae)3
- Cicadariae (Zikaden) aus den Oberoligocanen Ablagerungen von Rott3
- Two new species of Pentacarinus from the Acrotiarini tribe in Burmese amber (Hemiptera, Fulgoromorpha, Cixiidae)2
- Systematic, palaeoecology, and palaeobiogeography of the insect fauna from Mexican amber2
- New fossil fulgoroid Homoptera from the amber of Chiapas, Mexico2
- Die im Bernstein befindlichen Hemipteren und Orthopteren der Vorwelt2
- New Cixiidae and Achilidae fossils from Middle Eocene Baltic amber (Hemiptera: Fulgoromorpha)1
- Glisachaemus jonasdamzeni gen. et sp. nov. of Cixiidae from the Eocene Baltic amber (Hemiptera: Fulgoromorpha)1
- Autrimpus sambiorum gen. and sp. nov. from Eocene Baltic amber and notes on Mnemosynini stat. nov. (Hemiptera: Fulgoroidea: Cixiidae)1
Each of the 62 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. 19 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 Cixiidae
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- James K. Lindsey
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Cixiidae 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
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Cixiidae”
- 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 itDelphacoidea through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Spinola 1839