In 2012, Michael Skvarla, director of Penn State University’s Insect Identification Laboratory, picked up what he thought was an antlion – a fairly common flying insect – on the side of a Walmart in Arkansas. But as it turned out, it was actually a Polystoechotes punctata, or giant lacewing, an insect from the Jurassic period.

Michael Skvarla / Penn State

Although the giant lacewing was once widespread, it was “mysteriously eradicated from eastern North America in the 1950s,” according to a Pennsylvania State University press release. Skvarla’s discovery was the first of its kind in the last 50 years. Fossil giant lacewings date back to the Middle Jurassic period, over 160 million years ago. Fossil lacewings are also “much more common compared to living specimens,” according to the authors of a 2018 study of fossil lacewing finds.

Scientists are still not sure why the insect disappeared, but suspect that urbanization and habitat changes may have played a role. “Entomology can serve as an early indicator of ecology,” Skvarla said. “The fact that this insect was spotted in a region where it has not been seen for over half a century tells us something about the environment in general.”

Skvarla discovered he had misidentified the insect while teaching a Zoom class in 2020 when he noticed that the antlions’ features did not match the specimen he had found. In 2022, he published his findings in the journal Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington.

“This discovery suggests that there may be undiscovered relict populations of this large, charismatic insect,” he said.

You might also like

Jurassic insect discovered at Walmart in Arkansas

Why space experts want to establish a lunar time zone

The Dilbert debate: Were the newspapers right to cancel the cartoon?