The superfamily Siricoidea is an archaic group of the order
Hymenoptera, consisting of six families (four extinct) of
xylophagous sawflies. The group is well represented in early
Tertiary
Tertiary ( ) is a widely used but obsolete term for the geologic period from 66 million to 2.6 million years ago.
The period began with the demise of the non- avian dinosaurs in the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, at the start ...
and
Mesozoic
The Mesozoic Era ( ), also called the Age of Reptiles, the Age of Conifers, and colloquially as the Age of the Dinosaurs is the second-to-last era of Earth's geological history, lasting from about , comprising the Triassic, Jurassic and Creta ...
times, but a number of living taxa remain, including the family
Anaxyelidae, which has recently been linked to this group (it was previously placed in the
Xyeloidea). The female
ovipositor is typically long and projects posteriorly, and is used to drill into wood.
Families
These six families belong to the superfamily Siricoidea:
[
* Siricidae (horntails)
* Xiphydriidae (wood wasps, sometimes treated as a separate superfamily, Xiphydrioidea)
* † Daohugoidae
* † Protosiricidae
* † Pseudosiricidae
* † Sinosiricidae
]
References
Sawflies
Hymenoptera superfamilies
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