Description

Cretaceous Cockroach and Cone
Cretaceous
Jiulongshan Formation
Beipiao, Liaoxi China.
35mm x 26mm cockroach and 47mm cone on 166mm slab.

Insect. Plant. Conifer. Association.

Cockroaches belong to the Order Blattodea along with termites.  While they are often said to date back to the Carboniferous (Pennsylvanian), this is actually in reference to “roachoids,” roach-like insects.  The Paleozoic roachoids died out and were replaced in the early Mesozoic by other roachoid groups.  Modern roaches appeared in the Early Cretaceous and apparently replaced the older groups by the beginning of the Cenozoic.

Here is an interesting association piece with an insect and a plant from a time when the evolution of flowering plants was in bloom and when many modern insect groups were also appearing.