these relationships may continue for millions of years, as it has in the pollination of flowering plants by insects. the gut contents, wing structures, and mouthparts of fossilized beetles and flies suggest that they acted as early pollinators. the association between beetles and angiosperms during the lower cretaceous period led to parallel radiations of angiosperms and insects into the late cretaceous. the evolution of nectaries in upper cretaceous flowers signals the beginning of the mutualism between hymenoptera and angiosperms.