5 Conclusions.
To date, the fossil record of Paederinae is restricted to the
Cretaceous. However, their presence at localities as far apart as
Brazil, Botswana, China and Myanmar during the Cretaceous suggests that
they must have arisen at a far earlier time. The new species has
diagnostic characters of the Paederinae: antennal insertions concealed
under “shelf” (and therefore not visible from above), and hypomeron of
prothorax with a well-developed post-coxal process. It also has
characters of the Pinophilini: elongated procoxae (as long as the
profemora), broad, oval, fully exposed trochantin and a conspicuous
second abdominal segment. Moreover, it has characters of the
Pinophilina: well-preserved pair of paratergites on segments III-VIII.
It differs from other Paederinae because it lacks an emarginate shape of
the rear margins of the elytra (Herman 2010), and has two pairs of
paratergites on each side of segments III-VI.
Rock fossils and amber fossils offer different palaeoenvironment
reconstructions. As such, understanding how rock fossils are fossilized
can lead to more accurate interpretations (Mnguni 2022; and Mnguni et
al. 2022). Finally, at Orapa, Afrinophilina orapa gen. nov.,
species nov. would have possibly been found in damp places, under logs,
litter or foliage, suggesting a habitat preference fidelity, correlated
with arrested evolution (i.e., morphological stasis) for this group over
a long evolutionary time. It was probably an active predator which
hunted near the crater-lake at Orapa, together with Afristenus
orapensis , which has also been recently described by Mnguni et al.
(2022). Using extant species, it is worth investigating the possible
insect-insect relationships between predators belonging in Paederinae
and Steninae.