Flea
Videos
Flea, the common name for the order Siphonaptera, includes 2,500 species of small flightless insects that live as external parasites of mammals and birds. Fleas live by ingesting the blood of their ho
Flea Scanning Electron Micrograph False Color
Dog flea (from top) larva, egg, pupa and adult
Flea larva
Cenozoic flea in amber, c. 20 mya, is morphologically modern.
Mecoptera
Videos
Mecoptera is an order of insects in the superorder Holometabola with about six hundred species in nine families worldwide. Mecopterans are sometimes called scorpionflies after their largest family, Pa
Flea
…chewing mouthparts and feed on organic debris left on their hosts' skin. Genetic evidence indicates that fleas are a specialised lineage of parasitic scorpionflies (Mecoptera) sensu lato, most closely related to the family Nannochoristidae. The earliest known fleas lived in the Middle Jurassic; modern-looking forms…
Skorpionsfliege Panorpa communis male full
Juracimbrophlebia ginkgofolia (Cimbrophlebiidae) reconstruction, Jurassic; China
Jurassipanorpa sticta (Panorpidae), Jurassic; China
Forewing of Dinokanaga andersoni (Dinopanorpidae), Eocene; Washington state