It's happening, people!
Yes, the giant "prehistoric" bug invasion is coming! And where else would you expect to see their scouts than a Walmart in the middle of Arkansas!
From USA Today:
On a routine trip to an Arkansas Walmart to pick up milk, a university scientist made a historically buggy discovery.
Michael Skvarla, director of Penn State University's Insect Identification Lab, found a mysterious large insect outside the Fayetteville super chain's building – an experience he remembers "vividly."
"I saw this huge insect on the side of the building," he said in a press release from Penn State. "I thought it looked interesting, so I put it in my hand and did the rest of my shopping with it between my fingers. I got home, mounted it, and promptly forgot about it for almost a decade."
Little did he know that years later, the giant flying bug was a "super-rare" Jurassic-era insect.
Jurassic-era insects still alive today?
That's a little suspicious if you ask me.
This dude who is an insect scientist saw this giant bug, kept it, mounted it, then forgot about it for a decade.
"We were watching what Dr. Skvarla saw under his microscope, and he's talking about the features and then just kinda stops," said Codey Mathis, a doctoral candidate in entomology at Penn State.
"We all realized together that the insect was not what it was labeled and was in fact a super-rare giant lacewing. I still remember the feeling. It was so gratifying to know that the excitement doesn't dim, the wonder isn't lost. Here we were making a true discovery in the middle of an online lab course."
Skvarla and his colleagues then performed DNA testing on the specimen to confirm its true identity.
Upon confirmation, he deposited the insect safely in the collections of the Frost Entomological Museum at Penn State, where scientists and students will have access to it for further research.
"It was one of those experiences you don't expect to have in a prerequisite lab course," said Louis Nastasi, a doctoral candidate studying entomology at the university. "Here we were, just looking at specimens to identify them, and all of a sudden, out of nowhere, this incredible new record pops up."
A truly bizarre discovery of a very rare insect.
A giant lacewing spotted in an urban area of Arkansas likely reveals a bigger story about biodiversity and a changing environment, Skvarla said. Explanations vary for the giant lacewing's disappearance from North America, he said, and still largely remain a mystery.
Scientists, the release says, hypothesize the insect's disappearance could be the result of the ever-increasing amount of artificial light and pollution of urbanization; suppression of forest fires in eastern North America, if the insects rely on post-fire environments; the introduction of non-native predators such as large ground beetles; and introduction of non-native earthworms, which significantly altered the composition of forest leaf litter and soil.
This insect is so rare it was assumed they were extinct from the dinosaur times, but they're still finding them in Walmarts in Arkansas.
The things you see at Wally World...
