Article: A new hybotine dipteran from the Cretaceous of Botswana

A Cretaceous dipteran, Pseudoacarterus orapaensis gen. et sp. nov. is described from Botswana. It is the only Mesozoic record of the subfamily Hybotinae, and the first fossil assignable to the family Hybotidae from the southern hemisphere. P. orapaensis indicates that the Hybotidae originated and diversified at least 40 million years before the previously accepted date. P. orapaensis may be ancestral to the extant genera Sabinios and Syndyas, but not Acarterus. The fossil supports predictions of a moist, well-vegetated and seasonal environment in the Cretaceous of this part of southern Africa. Diversification of the Hybotinae appears closely allied with that of the angiosperms.