Anochetus dubius is known from the solitary fossil insect which, along with two soil particles, is an
inclusion in a transparent yellow chunk of
Dominican amber. The amber dates from at least the
Burdigalian stage of the Miocene, based on studying the associated fossil
foraminifera, and may be as old as the Middle Eocene, based on the associated fossil
coccoliths. This age range is due to the host rock being secondary deposits for the amber, and the Miocene as the age range is only the youngest that it might be. At the time of description, the
holotype specimen, number "Do-4192", was preserved in the
State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart amber collections in
Baden-Württemberg,
Germany. The holotype fossil was first studied by entomologist Maria L. De Andrade of the
University of Basle with her 1991
type description of the new species being published in the journal
Stuttgarter Beiträge zur Naturkunde. Serie B (Geologie und Paläontologie). The
specific epithet dubius is derived from the
Latin dubius meaning "doubtful", a reference to the uncertain affinities to any specific modern
Anochetus species group. The species is one of eight
Anochetus which have been described from Dominican amber. Two species were described prior to
A. dubius:
A. corayi in 1980 and
A. brevidentatus in 1991. The remaining five species—
A. ambiguus,
A. conisquamis,
A. exstinctus,
A. intermedius, and
A. lucidus—were all described by De Andrade in the same 1994 paper as
A. dubius. A number of modern species live in the Greater Antilles, with at least three modern species found on Hispaniola. == Description ==