An ancient hunter preserved
In the Hukawng Valley of northern Myanmar, pieces of fossilized tree resin reveal a snapshot of life from 100 million years ago. This substance, known as Burmese amber or burmite, contains some of the most perfectly preserved Cretaceous fossils ever found. Among them are praying mantises that appear remarkably modern. These specimens demonstrate that the mantis's specialized predatory body plan—complete with spined, grasping forelegs—was already fully developed during the age of dinosaurs.
One adult mantis found here, named Burmantis zherikhini, had large, bulbous compound eyes measuring 1.07 by 0.56 millimeters. The fossil record for mantises is exceptionally sparse, which makes these amber inclusions invaluable. They show that this successful insect design has persisted with little alteration for an immense stretch of geological time. The age of these fossils is not an estimate; uranium-lead (U–Pb) dating of zircon crystals trapped within the amber-bearing layers provides a precise age of 98.79 million years, placing them in the earliest Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous.
A Cretaceous ecosystem in amber
The amber deposits of Kachin State offer a single species. They preserve an entire forest ecosystem. The diversity of life found is one of the most diverse known from the Mesozoic Era. Over 2,800 species have been described from the amber as of 2023. The inclusions suggest the amber originated in a warm, tropical environment.
The resin entombed a wide array of organisms that lived alongside the mantis. The fossils include over 100 species from the insect group Dictyoptera, which contains mantises, cockroaches, and termites. The amber also holds spiders, the oldest known velvet worms, scorpions, and pseudoscorpions. Vertebrate remains are much rarer but far from unknown. Scientists have identified bird feathers, lizards, snakes, frogs, and even fragments of dinosaurs within the amber. These finds provide a three-dimensional record of a world that vanished millions of years ago.