Cratolocustopsis aquila sp. nov. urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act: 6013C196-AEE9-4A17-9992-196C40D28AAB Fig. 4 Etymology: The species name derives from the Latin aquila, meaning “eagle”. It refers to the head shape of the specimen, which resembles the beak of a bird of prey. This appearance is the result of damage to the fossil and does represent the actual morphology of the species. Locality and horizon: Type locality imprecise; from one of the several quarries in the region of Nova Olinda and Santana do Cariri municipalities, Ceará State, Brazil. Nova Olinda Member, Crato Formation, Santana Group. Early Cretaceous, Aptian. Type material: Holotype, sex unknown, in the collection of Museu de Paleontologia Plácido Cidade Nuvens, Universidade Regional do Cariri, Santana do Cariri, Ceará, Brazil, coll. no. MPSC 9840. Diagnosis: Species recognized by MP strongly concave in distal fourth, almost parallel to anal wing margin. RP originates posterior to fork of M. RP bifurcates shortly after origin. Note: latter character may represent an individual aberration. Description: Body, forewing and left metafemur as well as most of metatibia preserved. Measurements: Body length 20.4 mm; abdomen ca. 10.3 mm. Head height 4.3 mm. Metafemur 12.1 mm long, 2.6 mm wide. Preserved part of metatibia 8.8 mm long. Forewing length 24.6 mm, 4.1 mm high. Legs: Length/height-ratio of metafemur 4.65. Oblique lateral carinae present. Metatibia with 7 small dorsal spines on preserved part (probably ca. 80% of metatibia length preserved). Forewing: Length/height-ratio 6. ScP length at least 85.9% of twl. Space between ScP and RA 11.4% of total wing height. Origin of RP at 50.5% of twl, posterior to M bifurcation. Space between RA and RP rather wide, 15% of wing height. RP with four branches. Shortly after its origin, RP is bifurcated; the upper branch is the “normal” RP, considered as RP1. Lower branch is fused to RA slightly anterior to branching of RP4. M with two branches. Fork of M at 45.9% of twl. Anterior and posterior branch of M parallel along most of their length, however MP describing a strong concave curve distally, almost making contact with MA2 as the latter touches wing margin. CuA + CuPaα with two branches. Anterior branch relatively parallel to MA2, reaching wing margin at 72.7% of twl. Posterior branch strongly concave similar to distal part of MP. Base of CuA + CuPaα (connection to CuPaβ) at 30% of twl. CuPaβ reaching anal wing margin at ca. 42.5% of twl (anal wing margin slightly damaged in the fossil, last millimeters of branch are lost). Cross vein pattern rather simple, consisting mainly of straight cross veins. Remarks: Cratolocustopsis aquila sp. nov. is assigned to Cratolocustopsis based on the presence of two branches of CuA+ CuPaα and two branches of M. It differs from C. cretacea by its MP being strongly concave distally (MP is parallel to MA2 along its entire length in C. cretacea (Fig. 6A in Martins-Neto (2003) and Fig. 5 from this study). Cratolocustopsis aquila further differs from the type species by the distal extent of the CuA + CuPaα branches: in the new species, both branches reach the wing margin, whereas in C. cretacea, only the anterior branch does so, with the posterior branch terminating in contact with CuPaβ. The new species also differs from C. contumax by being significantly larger; the forewing of C. contumax measures 18 mm in length, whereas that of C. aquila is 24.6 mm long.

Published as part of Schall, Ole-Kristian Odin, Lima, Daniel, Heads, Sam W., Pinheiro, Allysson P., Kotthoff, Ulrich & Husemann, Martin, 2025, New species of Cretaceous Locustopsidae (Orthoptera: Caelifera) from the Crato Formation of Brazil and a taxonomic revision of the family, pp. 485-508 in Zootaxa 5722 (4) on pages 494-495, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.5722.4.2, http://zenodo.org/record/17892596