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Journal articles on the topic 'Mammal fossils'
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1
Davies, Thomas W., Mark A. Bell, Anjali Goswami, and Thomas J. D. Halliday. "Completeness of the eutherian mammal fossil record and implications for reconstructing mammal evolution through the Cretaceous/Paleogene mass extinction." Paleobiology 43, no. 4 (2017): 521–36. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/pab.2017.20.
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AbstractThere is a well-established discrepancy between paleontological and molecular data regarding the timing of the origin and diversification of placental mammals. Molecular estimates place interordinal diversification dates in the Cretaceous, while no unambiguous crown placental fossils have been found prior to the end-Cretaceous mass extinction. Here, the completeness of the eutherian fossil record through geological time is evaluated to assess the suggestion that a poor fossil record is largely responsible for the difference in estimates of placental origins. The completeness of fossil specimens was measured using the character completeness metric, which quantifies the completeness of fossil taxa as the percentage of phylogenetic characters available to be scored for any given taxon. Our data set comprised 33 published cladistic matrices representing 445 genera, of which 333 were coded at the species level.There was no significant difference in eutherian completeness across the Cretaceous/Paleogene (K/Pg) boundary. This suggests that the lack of placental mammal fossils in the Cretaceous is not due to a poor fossil record but more likely represents a genuine absence of placental mammals in the Cretaceous. This result supports the “explosive model” of early placental evolution, whereby placental mammals originated around the time of the K/Pg boundary and diversified soon after.No correlation was found between the completeness pattern observed in this study and those of previous completeness studies on birds and sauropodomorph dinosaurs, suggesting that different factors affect the preservation of these groups. No correlations were found with various isotope proxy measures, but Akaike information criterion analysis found that eutherian character completeness metric scores were best explained by models involving the marine-carbonate strontium-isotope ratios (87Sr/86Sr), suggesting that tectonic activity might play a role in controlling the completeness of the eutherian fossil record.
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Mayhew, D. F., F. E. Dieleman, A. A. Slupik, L. W. van den Hoek Ostende, and J. W. F. Reumer. "Small mammal assemblages from the Quaternary succession at Moriaanshoofd (Zeeland, the Netherlands) and their significance for correlating the Oosterschelde fauna." Netherlands Journal of Geosciences - Geologie en Mijnbouw 93, no. 3 (2014): 119–34. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/njg.2014.6.
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AbstractWe investigated fossil small mammals from a borehole near Moriaanshoofd (Zeeland, southwest Netherlands) in order to get better insights in the fossil mammal faunas that are found in the subsurface in the southwestern Netherlands, and to investigate the age and provenance of the mammal fauna that is being dredged from the deep tidal gullies in the nearby Oosterschelde estuary. The record in the borehole covers Gelasian (Early Pleistocene) to Holocene deposits, represented by six formations. Thirty-nine specimens of small mammals were obtained from the borehole. These fossils derived from the Early Pleistocene marine Maassluis Formation and from directly overlying deposits of a Late Pleistocene age. During Weichselian times (33–24 ka), a proto-Schelde River shaped the northern Oosterschelde area. The river reworked substantial amounts of Early and Middle Pleistocene deposits. At the base of the Schelde-derived fluvial sequence (regionally described as the Koewacht Formation), Gelasian vertebrate faunas were concentrated in the channel lag. The Late Pleistocene channel lag is almost certainly the main source for the rich Early Pleistocene vertebrate faunas with larger mammals dredged from the Oosterschelde.
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Smith, Vincent S., Tom Ford, Kevin P. Johnson, Paul C. D. Johnson, Kazunori Yoshizawa, and Jessica E. Light. "Multiple lineages of lice pass through the K–Pg boundary." Biology Letters 7, no. 5 (2011): 782–85. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2011.0105.
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For modern lineages of birds and mammals, few fossils have been found that predate the Cretaceous–Palaeogene (K–Pg) boundary. However, molecular studies using fossil calibrations have shown that many of these lineages existed at that time. Both birds and mammals are parasitized by obligate ectoparasitic lice (Insecta: Phthiraptera), which have shared a long coevolutionary history with their hosts. Evaluating whether many lineages of lice passed through the K–Pg boundary would provide insight into the radiation of their hosts. Using molecular dating techniques, we demonstrate that the major louse suborders began to radiate before the K–Pg boundary. These data lend support to a Cretaceous diversification of many modern bird and mammal lineages.
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McDowell, Matthew C., and Graham C. Medlin. "Natural Resource Management implications of the pre-European non-volant mammal fauna of the southern tip of Eyre Peninsula, South Australia." Australian Mammalogy 32, no. 2 (2010): 87. http://dx.doi.org/10.1071/am09020.
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Sinkholes and coastal caves located in, around and between the Coffin Bay and Lincoln National Parks were surveyed for pre-European fossils, which were collected from or just below the sediment surface. Twenty-four pre-European fossil samples, including eight already in the collections of the South Australian Museum, were analysed and 25 native and five introduced species of non-volant mammal were identified. Native and introduced species were often found together, indicating that the sites have accumulated mammal remains in both pre- and post-European times. Only four of the non-volant native mammals recovered are known to be extant in the study area today: Lasiorhinus latifrons, Macropus fuliginosus, Cercartetus concinnus and Rattus fuscipes. In contrast, 20 native species recorded have been extirpated and one (Potorous platyops) is now extinct. C. concinnus was recorded from only one of the fossil assemblages but is known to be widespread in the study area today. This may indicate recent vegetation change related to European land management practices and have implications for natural resource management in the area.
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Slupik, A. A., F. P. Wesselingh, D. F. Mayhew, et al. "The role of a proto-Schelde River in the genesis of the southwestern Netherlands, inferred from the Quaternary successions and fossils in Moriaanshoofd Borehole (Zeeland, the Netherlands)." Netherlands Journal of Geosciences - Geologie en Mijnbouw 92, no. 1 (2013): 69–86. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0016774600000299.
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AbstractWe investigated the Quaternary lithological succession and faunas in a borehole near Moriaanshoofd (Province of Zeeland, SW Netherlands), in order to improve our understanding of the depositional context of classical Gelasian mammal faunas from the region. The fossils mostly derive from the base of a fossil-rich interval between 31 m and 36.5 m below the surface, that was initially interpreted as a Middle or Late Pleistocene interglacial marine unit, but turned out to be a Late Quaternary fluvial unit with large amounts of reworked fossils and sediments. Eocene mollusc taxa pinpoint Flanders (Belgium) as the source region for this river. Within the base of this paleo-Schelde River fossil material of various stratigraphic provenance became incorporated.
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Brinkman, P. "Bartholomew James Sulivan's discovery of fossil vertebrates in the Tertiary beds of Patagonia." Archives of Natural History 30, no. 1 (2003): 56–74. http://dx.doi.org/10.3366/anh.2003.30.1.56.
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While commanding a Royal Navy survey of the Falkland Islands in 1845, Bartholomew James Sulivan discovered and collected fossil mammals at Rio Gallegos, Patagonia. Described the following year by Richard Owen, Sulivan's specimens comprised the first collection taken from what would later be designated the Santa Cruz beds (early-middle Miocene), the most prolific fossil mammal horizon in South America and the oldest discovered by Sulivan's time. Unfortunately, Charles Darwin's conservative estimate of the age of the fossils delayed the full appreciation of Sulivan's discovery. Sulivan was only moderately successful at attracting interest in his discovery among British naturalists. By the time that the first extensive collections of Santa Cruz fossil mammals were made by Argentine paleontologists Carlos and Florentino Ameghino, in the 1890s, Sulivan's pioneering role in the history of South American vertebrate paleontology had been overshadowed and all but forgotten. An examination of Sulivan's experience provides a general model for the process whereby some contributors to science descend from initial fame to lasting obscurity.
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LOPES, RENATO PEREIRA, FRANCISCO SEKIGUCHI BUCHMANN, FELIPE CARON, and MARIA ELIZABETH ITUSARRY. "Tafonomia de Fósseis de Vertebrados (Megafauna Extinta) Encontrados nas Barrancas do Arroio Chuí e Linha de Costa, Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil." Pesquisas em Geociências 28, no. 2 (2001): 67. http://dx.doi.org/10.22456/1807-9806.20269.
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The present work describes the taphonomy of the extinct mammals’ fossils (Pleistocene megafauna) found in Chuí creek embankment, in Rio Grande do Sul State, southern Brazil and compares them to the mammals’ fossils occurring along the shoreline of the same State. These mammals lived during the Upper Pleistocene (Lujanense land-mammal period) about 120000 years ago; the fossils that occurs along Chuí creek and the ones found along the shoreline suffered deposition in coastal lagoons, originated during events of sea transgression-regression, althought the last ones are now found in subaquatic environments, preserved in submerged biodetritic banks along the coast and are being thrown onto the beach during storm events. These fossils are extremely hard and dark, due to substitution of the bone’s original calcium phosphate by silicates and oxides. While these fossils are found fragmented on the beach due to wave action and transport, the fossils occurring along Chuí creek embankment are well preserved, indicating that they haven’t suffered significant transport; the latter show light colour and more fragility due to lixiviation. Articulated parts of mammals are found, and many bones show grooves and scratches, suggesting the action of scavengers after death. They are found in situ at a depth of 2,5-3,5m in lacustrine sediments of Pleistocene origin in the Chuí creek embankment and above a layer of oxidated beach sands which show parallel stratification and galleries of the Callianassa crustacean.
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MacFadden, Bruce J., and Richard C. Hulbert. "Calibration of mammoth (Mammuthus) dispersal into North America using rare earth elements of Plio-Pleistocene mammals from Florida." Quaternary Research 71, no. 1 (2009): 41–48. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yqres.2008.04.008.
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AbstractThe first appearance of mammoth (Mammuthus) is currently used to define the beginning of the Irvingtonian North American Land Mammal Age at about 1.4 Ma. Thereafter, mammoth fossils are common and widespread in North America until the end of the Pleistocene. In contrast to this generally accepted biochronology, recent reports have asserted that mammoth occurs in late Pliocene (ca. 2.5 Ma) alluvium from the Santa Fe River of northern Florida. The supposedly contemporaneous late Pliocene fossil assemblage from the Santa Fe River that produced the mammoth specimens actually consists of a mixture of diagnostic Blancan (late Pliocene) and late Rancholabrean (latest Pleistocene) species. Fossil bones and teeth of the two mammalian faunas mixed together along the Santa Fe River have significantly different rare earth element (REE) signatures. The REE signatures of mammoth are indistinguishable from those of Rancholabrean mammals, yet they are different from those of diagnostic Blancan vertebrates from these same temporally mixed faunas of the Santa Fe River. Thus, no evidence for late Pliocene mammoth exists in Florida, and mammoth fossils remain reliable biochronological indicators for Irvingtonian and Rancholabrean terrestrial sequences throughout mid- and lower-latitude North America.
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Chester, Stephen G. B., Jonathan I. Bloch, Doug M. Boyer, and William A. Clemens. "Oldest known euarchontan tarsals and affinities of Paleocene Purgatorius to Primates." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112, no. 5 (2015): 1487–92. http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1421707112.
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Earliest Paleocene Purgatorius often is regarded as the geologically oldest primate, but it has been known only from fossilized dentitions since it was first described half a century ago. The dentition of Purgatorius is more primitive than those of all known living and fossil primates, leading some researchers to suggest that it lies near the ancestry of all other primates; however, others have questioned its affinities to primates or even to placental mammals. Here we report the first (to our knowledge) nondental remains (tarsal bones) attributed to Purgatorius from the same earliest Paleocene deposits that have yielded numerous fossil dentitions of this poorly known mammal. Three independent phylogenetic analyses that incorporate new data from these fossils support primate affinities of Purgatorius among euarchontan mammals (primates, treeshrews, and colugos). Astragali and calcanei attributed to Purgatorius indicate a mobile ankle typical of arboreal euarchontan mammals generally and of Paleocene and Eocene plesiadapiforms specifically and provide the earliest fossil evidence of arboreality in primates and other euarchontan mammals. Postcranial specializations for arboreality in the earliest primates likely played a key role in the evolutionary success of this mammalian radiation in the Paleocene.
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Hopson, James A. "The Mammal-Like Reptiles: A Study of Transitional Fossils." American Biology Teacher 49, no. 1 (1987): 16–26. http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/4448410.
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Master, Sharad. "New information on the first vertebrate fossil discoveries from Lesotho in 1867." Archives of Natural History 46, no. 2 (2019): 230–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.3366/anh.2019.0587.
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In the 1870s, Richard Owen of the British Museum received a consignment of vertebrate fossils from Basutoland (Lesotho), which were sent to him by Dr Hugh Exton from Bloemfontein, and he published an illustrated catalogue of these in 1876. In 1884, he described from this collection a “Triassic mammal”– Tritylodon longaevus (an important cynodont therapsid or mammal-like reptile). New information has been found concerning the discovery, locality, stratigraphic position and discoverers of the Basutoland vertebrate fossils. The information is contained in two letters sent to Dr Alexander Logie du Toit by David Draper, in 1929. Draper revealed in these letters that the fossils were found during a raiding party by horse commandos from the Orange Free State during the Basuto War of 1867. Draper then was an 18-year-old, and he had assisted Exton with collecting vertebrate fossils from the “Upper Red Beds” (of the Karoo Supergroup) at a site whose location he pointed out on a map (the present day Thaba Tso'eu). The discovery of fossils by Exton and Draper in 1867 was the first find of any fossils in Basutoland.
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Bunn, H. T., A. Z. P. Mabulla, M. Domínguez-Rodrigo, et al. "Was FLK North levels 1–2 a classic “living floor” of Oldowan hominins or a taphonomically complex palimpsest dominated by large carnivore feeding behavior?" Quaternary Research 74, no. 3 (2010): 355–62. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yqres.2010.06.004.
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AbstractFrom excavation at FLK North levels 1–2 in 1960–1962, Mary Leakey reported approximately 1200 Oldowan artifacts and 3300 large mammal fossils as a hominin “living floor”. Preliminary taphonomic analysis by Bunn seemed supportive, based on the presence of some cut-marked bones, the concentration of several dozen bovid individuals, and the relative abundance of limbs and mandibles over other axial elements. Recent taphonomic analysis of Leakey's entire fossil assemblage by Domínguez-Rodrigo and Barba, however, documents a minor hominin role at the site, contrasted to the dominant role of carnivores. Felids brought prey animals; hyenas scavenged from abandoned felid meals. At different times, hominins butchered several bovids and discarded artifacts at this dynamic location. Since 2006, renewed excavations at FLK North and other sites by the Olduvai Paleoanthropology and Paleoecology Project (TOPPP) have expanded artifact and fossil samples and implemented new analytical approaches to clarify taphonomic histories of the Olduvai paleolandscape. At FLK North, > 1000 new large mammal fossils from levels 1 to 2 show minimal butchery evidence amid abundant evidence of carnivore gnawing/fracture, rodent gnawing, and sediment abrasion. To help guide future excavation and analyses, we have developed several alternative working hypotheses of site formation.
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Steadman, David W., and Bruce J. MacFadden. "A large eagle (Aves, Accipitridae) from the early Miocene of Panama." Journal of Paleontology 90, no. 5 (2016): 1012–15. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/jpa.2016.103.
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AbstractWe report the first Tertiary bird fossil from Central America, an ungual phalanx from a large, unknown genus and species of Accipitridae from the early Miocene Centenario Fauna, Panama. This specimen provides another example of a Neogene bird from North and Central America with its possible closest living relatives occurring today in Africa. In contrast, there is no evidence of African affinities among the reptile or mammal fossils from the Centenario Fauna.
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Megirian, Dirk, Gavin J. Prideaux, Peter F. Murray, and Neil Smit. "An Australian land mammal age biochronological scheme." Paleobiology 36, no. 4 (2010): 658–71. http://dx.doi.org/10.1666/09047.1.
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Constrained seriation of a species-locality matrix of the Australian Cenozoic mammal record resolves a preliminary sixfold succession of land mammal ages apparently spanning the late Oligocene to the present. The applied conditions of local chronostratigraphic succession and inferences of relative stage-of-evolution biochronology lead to the expression of a continental geological timescale consisting of, from the base, the Etadunnan, Wipajirian, Camfieldian, Waitean, Tirarian, and Naracoortean land mammal ages. Approximately 99% of the 360 fossil assemblages analyzed are classifiable using this method. Each is characterized by a diagnostic suite of species. An interval of age magnitude may eventually be shown to lie between the Camfieldian and Waitean, but is currently insufficiently represented by fossils to diagnose. Development of a land mammal age framework marks a progressive step in Australian vertebrate biochronology, previously expressed only in terms of local faunas. Overall, however, the record remains poorly calibrated to the Standard Chronostratigraphic Scale. Codifying the empirical record as a land mammal age sequence provides an objective basis for expressing faunal succession without resort to standard chronostratigraphic terms with the attendant (and hitherto commonly taken) risks of miscorrelating poorly dated Australian events to well-dated global events.
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Piskoulis, Pavlos. "Potential precipitation-driven body size differentiation of Rhinolophus ferrumequinum from the Late to latest Pleistocene of Loutra Almopias Cave A (Pella, Macedonia, Greece)." Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie - Abhandlungen 297, no. 3 (2020): 311–23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1127/njgpa/2020/0927.
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The hypothesis that the body size of Rhinolophus ferrumequinum does not follow Bergmann's rule was examined. The Loutra Almopias Cave A bears two chronologically different small mammal faunal assemblages of Late and latest Pleistocene age, where fossil specimens of the afore-mentioned species have been retrieved. The measurements of the fossils showed that there is a differentiation in tooth size and thus body size from the Late to latest Pleistocene indicating a correlation of the latter with climate.
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Fusco, Diana A., Matthew C. McDowell, Graham Medlin, and Gavin J. Prideaux. "Fossils reveal late Holocene diversity and post-European decline of the terrestrial mammals of the Murray–Darling Depression." Wildlife Research 44, no. 1 (2017): 60. http://dx.doi.org/10.1071/wr16134.
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Context Establishing appropriate faunal baselines is critical for understanding and abating biodiversity declines. However, baselines can be highly reliant on historical records that come from already disturbed ecosystems. This is exemplified in the Murray–Darling Depression bioregion of Australia, where European settlement (and accompanying marked land-management changes and the introduction of many species) triggered rapid declines and losses of native species, often before their documentation. Aims We aim to establish the mammal fauna present when Europeans settled the Murray Mallee and Murray–Darling Depression bioregion and determine the extent of mammal loss since European settlement. Methods We describe a dated vertebrate assemblage from Light’s Roost in the lower Murray Mallee region of South Australia. We compare our data with those of modern fauna surveys and historical records to document the extent of change in the mammal fauna since European settlement. Key results Radiocarbon ages showed that the assemblage was accumulating, at a minimum, within an interval from 1900 to 1300 years ago. Since this time, the Murray–Darling Depression has lost half of its flightless terrestrial mammals. Species lost include the mulgara (Dasycercus blythi/cristicauda), which places this taxon within only 40km of Lake Alexandrina, the hitherto-disputed type locality for D. cristicauda. Fossils provided the principal evidence for nearly half of the Murray Mallee fauna and over three-quarters of the fauna are represented in the fossil record. Conclusions Late Holocene assemblages provide important archives of species biogeography and diversity. Our revised faunal baseline indicated that the pre-European fauna of the Murray–Darling Depression was more diverse than hitherto understood and its reduction appears largely caused by the impacts of European settlement. Implications Baselines for species distributions derived from historical records and modern faunal surveys are likely to be incomplete and warrant revision, particularly for smaller and more cryptic species. Deficiencies in regional records mask the extent of mammal declines caused by European colonisation and associated agricultural practices, and thus vulnerability to anthropogenic disturbance.
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van Kolfschoten, Th. "The Eemian mammal fauna of central Europe." Netherlands Journal of Geosciences 79, no. 2-3 (2000): 269–81. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0016774600021752.
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AbstractThe knowledge of the Eemian fauna of central Europe is based on the fossil record from a number of sites located in the eastern part of Germany. The faunas with different deer species as well as Sus scrofa, Palaeoloxodon antiquus, Stephanorhinus kirchbergensis and Glis glis indicate a forested environment alternating during the climatic optimum of the Eemian s.s. with areas with a more open environment inhabited by species such as Cricetus cricetus, Equus sp. (or Equus taubachensis), Equus hydruntinus and Stephanorhinus hemitoechus. Characteristic for the Rhine valley fauna are Hippopotamus amphibius and the water buffalo (Bubalus murrensis); both species are absent in the eastern German faunas with an Eemian age.Taking into account the short period of time covered by the Eemian s.s., the amount of data on the Eemian mammalian fauna is remarkably large. There is, however, still an ongoing debate on whether the stratigraphical position of a number of faunas are of Eemian or ‘intra-Saalian’ age. Furthermore, there are faunal assemblages or stratigraphically isolated finds referred to the Eemian without indisputable evidence. This is particularly the case in the Rhine valley, where most of the so-called Eemian fossils come from dredged assemblages. The picture of the evolution of the Eemian fauna and its geographical variation is consequently still incomplete.
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Lucas, Spencer G. "The first Oligocene mammal from New Mexico." Journal of Paleontology 60, no. 6 (1986): 1274–76. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0022336000003000.
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Oligocene landscapes of New Mexico were dominated by andesite stratovolcanoes and resurgent domes of ash-flow tuff (ignimbrite) cauldrons (Smith et al., 1985). This pervasive volcanism produced volcanic and volcaniclastic rocks that have been neglected by vertebrate paleontologists, so that, until now, no Oligocene vertebrate fossils have been discovered in New Mexico. This documents the initial results of vertebrate paleontological investigations of Oligocene rocks in New Mexico, a lower jaw of the oromerycid artiodactyl Montanatylopus matthewi, the first Oligocene mammal from the state. In this paper, CM = Carnegie Museum of Natural History and UNM = University of New Mexico.
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Benammi, Mouloud, Elina Aidona, Gildas Merceron, George D. Koufos, and Dimitris S. Kostopoulos. "Magnetostratigraphy and Chronology of the Lower Pleistocene Primate Bearing Dafnero Fossil Site, N. Greece." Quaternary 3, no. 3 (2020): 22. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/quat3030022.
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This paper aims to contribute to the stratigraphic and geochronological evaluation of the primate bearing Dafnero fossil site of Northern Greece by means of lithostratigraphic, paleomagnetic and paleontological analyses. The 60 m thick fossiliferous deposits of fluviatile origin are recognized as representing a typical braided-river sequence unconformably overlying molassic sediments. Rock magnetic investigations indicate the presence of both medium and low coercivity minerals. Paleomagnetic sampling of the Dafnero sediments yielded a stable magnetic remanence, and the characteristic remanent magnetization directions pass reversal test with dual polarity. Based on calibration from mammal fossils, the normal polarity magnetozone N1 located in the upper third of the studied section could correlate with chron C2n (the Olduvai subchron), suggesting that the fossil horizon is within C2r with an extrapolated age of 2.4–2.3 Ma and rather closer to the upper age limit. The results allow the re-calibration of several middle Villafranchian assemblages of S. Balkans and the correlation of the corresponding mammal fauna with the environmental shifts of Praetiglian, as it is recorded in climatostratigraphic data from the Black Sea.
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Koufos, G. D. "NEOGENE AND QUATERNARY CONTINENTAL BIOSTRATIGRAPHY OF GREECE BASED ON MAMMALS." Bulletin of the Geological Society of Greece 50, no. 1 (2017): 55. http://dx.doi.org/10.12681/bgsg.11701.
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Most basins of Greece were filled with thick Neogene-Quaternary continental deposits, which include a large number of mammal fossiliferous sites. The investigations of the last 40 years in the various basins of Greece led to the discovery of many new fossiliferous sites. The extensive, long time and continuous excavations in the new fossiliferous sites as well as in the previously known ones - like the classical localities of Axios Valley, Pikermi and Samos Island - provided numerous fossils enriching remarkably the Greek fossil mammal record. The systematic study of these collections provided numerous data for their biochronology. Further magnetostratigraphic, radiometric or other methods of absolute chronology provided additional chronological data for the mammal faunas and the corresponding deposits. The correlation of all these data allowed the biostratigraphic classification of the continental Neogene Quaternary deposits of Greece which is given in the biostratigraphic tables of the present article. From these tables it is clear that for some time-intervals (Late Miocene, Early Pleistocene) the data are abundant allowing a detailed biostratigraphy, but for some others (Early- Middle Miocene, Pliocene, and for some time-spans of Early Pleistocene) the data are imited or missing and cannot allow an accurate and complete biostratigraphy.
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Fuentes, Anthony J., William C. Clyde, Ken Weissenburger, et al. "Constructing a time scale of biotic recovery across the Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary, Corral Bluffs, Denver Basin, Colorado, U.S.A." Rocky Mountain Geology 54, no. 2 (2019): 133–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.24872/rmgjournal.54.2.133.
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ABSTRACT The Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) boundary interval represents one of the most significant mass extinctions and ensuing biotic recoveries in Earth history. Earliest Paleocene fossil mammal faunas corresponding to the Puercan North American Land Mammal Age (NALMA) are thought to be highly endemic and potentially diachronous, necessitating precise chronostratigraphic controls at key fossil localities to constrain recovery dynamics in continental biotas following the K–Pg mass extinction. The Laramide synorgenic sedimentary deposits within the Denver Basin in east-central Colorado preserve one of the most continuous and fossiliferous records of the K–Pg boundary interval in North America. Poor exposure in much of the Denver Basin, however, makes it difficult to correlate between outcrops. To constrain fossil localities in coeval strata across the basin, previous studies have relied upon chronostratigraphic methods such as magnetostratigraphy. Here, we present a new high-resolution magnetostratigraphy of 10 lithostratigraphic sections spanning the K–Pg boundary interval at Corral Bluffs located east of Colorado Springs in the southern part of the Denver Basin. Fossil localities from Corral Bluffs have yielded limited dinosaur remains, mammal fossils assigned to the Puercan NALMA, and numerous fossil leaf localities. Palynological analyses identifying the K–Pg boundary in three sections and two independent, but nearly identical, 206Pb/238U age estimates for the same volcanic ash, provide key temporal calibration points. Our paleomagnetic analyses have identified clear polarity reversal boundaries from chron C30n to chron C28r across the sections. It is now possible to place the fossil localities at Corral Bluffs within the broader basin-wide chronostratigraphic framework and evaluate them in the context of K–Pg boundary extinction and recovery.
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Buffetaut, Eric. "From Charles Darwin’s comments to the first mention of South American giant fossil birds: Auguste Bravard’s catalogue of fossil species from Argentina (1860) and its significance." Bulletin de la Société Géologique de France 187, no. 1 (2016): 41–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.2113/gssgfbull.187.1.41.
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Abstract In 1860, the French geologist and palaeontologist Auguste Bravard (1803–1861) circulated a small number of copies of a hand-written and lithographed catalogue of the fossils he had collected in various parts of Argentina over a period of about eight years. Although the existence of this catalogue has been mentioned by various authors, it has never been really published in full. A facsimile reproduction is provided here. The contents of the catalogue and reactions to them are discussed, with special attention to comments in the correspondence between Charles Lyell and Charles Darwin. These comments were largely about Bravard’s identification among his fossils from Argentina of the genera Palaeotherium and Anoplotherium, well known components of the Late Eocene mammal fauna from the Montmartre gypsum, in the Paris Basin. This identification was later shown to be erroneous by Gervais, Burmeister and Ameghino. Bravard’s catalogue also includes what appears to be the first mention of fossil giant ground birds (Phorusrhacidae) in South America.
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Tseng, Z. Jack, Adolfo Pacheco-Castro, Oscar Carranza-Castañeda, José Jorge Aranda-Gómez, Xiaoming Wang, and Hilda Troncoso. "Discovery of the fossil otter Enhydritherium terraenovae (Carnivora, Mammalia) in Mexico reconciles a palaeozoogeographic mystery." Biology Letters 13, no. 6 (2017): 20170259. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2017.0259.
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The North American fossil otter Enhydritherium terraenovae is thought to be partially convergent in ecological niche with the living sea otter Enhydra lutris , both having low-crowned crushing teeth and a close association with marine environments. Fossil records of Enhydritherium are found in mostly marginal marine deposits in California and Florida; despite presence of very rich records of fossil terrestrial mammals in contemporaneous localities inland, no Enhydritherium fossils are hitherto known in interior North America. Here we report the first occurrence of Enhydritherium outside of Florida and California, in a land-locked terrestrial mammal fauna of the upper Miocene deposits of Juchipila Basin, Zacatecas State, Mexico. This new occurrence of Enhydritherium is at least 200 km from the modern Pacific coastline, and nearly 600 km from the Gulf of Mexico. Besides providing further evidence that Enhydritherium was not dependent on coastal marine environments as originally interpreted, this discovery leads us to propose a new east-to-west dispersal route between the Florida and California Enhydritherium populations through central Mexico. The proximity of the fossil locality to nearby populations of modern neotropical otters Lontra longicaudis suggests that trans-Mexican freshwater corridors for vertebrate species in riparian habitats may have persisted for a prolonged period of time, pre-dating the Great American Biotic Interchange.
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Arcos, Saleta, Paloma Sevilla, and Yolanda Fernández-Jalvo. "Preliminary small mammal taphonomy of FLK NW level 20 (Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania)." Quaternary Research 74, no. 3 (2010): 405–10. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yqres.2010.06.002.
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AbstractThe Bed-I series of Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania) is a reference site in human evolution, having yielded the holotypes of Paranthropus boisei and Homo habilis, together with manufactured artefacts and abundant large and micro-fauna. Excavations in Olduvai Gorge have been recently resumed, with new aims and new results. This paper presents the results of the taphonomic analysis carried out on a fossil small-mammal assemblage recovered from FLK NW level 20, a layer overlying Tuff C, dated from 1.84 Ma. The analysis provides good evidence of a category 1 predator, most likely a barn owl, as the predator of the bone assemblage. Trampling and sediment compression might influence postdepositional breakage of the bones. This study is especially relevant since previous taphonomic analyses carried out at levels above and below this sample led to inconclusive results due to a low number of fossils (Fernández-Jalvo et al., 1998). The new sample provides new information to reconstruct the paleoenvironmental context in which early hominins inhabited.
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Koretsky, I. A., and S. J. Rahmat. "Unique Short-Faced Miocene Seal Discovered in Grytsiv (Ukraine)." Zoodiversity 55, no. 2 (2021): 143–54. http://dx.doi.org/10.15407/zoo2021.02.143.
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Numerous Miocene terrestrial mammal fossils have been discovered at the Grytsiv locality of Ukraine, but this is the first record of a fossil marine mammal at this site. Morphological analysis of the rostral portion of this middle-late Miocene (12.3–11.8 Ma) partial skull suggests that it belongs to the subfamily Phocinae. The small size and cranial morphology of this partial skull is compared with recent and fossil representatives of the extant subfamily Phocinae and the extinct subfamily Devinophocinae. Extinct and modern representatives of the extant subfamilies Cystophorinae and Monachinae were not incorporated in this study due to their extremely large size in comparison to this new find. This newly described skull belonged to a small-sized seal (likely similar in size to the modern sea otter based on the width of the rostrum) with an extremely short rostrum and several other diagnostic characters that differ from all other fossil and extant phocines. Due to the lack of preservation and fragility of fossil seal skulls, less than 20 have been described so far. This new skull is yet another example of an ancestral seal, supporting the suggestion that modern seals have become larger over their evolutionary history. Overall, any cranial information on fossil true seals is extremely important since it allows resolving contentious phylogenetic relationships between extinct and extant representatives of this group.
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Mustoe, George E. "Lower Eocene Footprints from Northwest Washington, USA. Part 1: Reptile Tracks." Geosciences 9, no. 7 (2019): 321. http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/geosciences9070321.
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Lower Eocene fluvial strata in the Chuckanut Formation preserve abundant bird and mammal tracks. Reptile trace fossils include footprints from a small turtle (ichnogenus Chelonipus), and several Crocodylian trackways that consist of irregularly spaced footprints associated with linear tail drag marks. The latter trackways represent “punting” locomotion, where a submerged Crocodylian used intermittent substrate contacts to provide forward motion of their neutrally buoyant bodies. Two adjacent sandstone blocks preserve Crocodylian trace fossils that are named herein as a new ichnogenus and ichnospecies Anticusuchipes amnis. Two other Crocodylian trackways lack sufficient detail for ichnotaxonomic assignment.
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Pei, W. C. "Note On A Collection Of Mammal Fossils From Tanyang in Kiangsu Province." Bulletin of the Geological Society of China 19, no. 4 (2009): 379–92. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-6724.1939.mp19004002.x.
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Lee, Yuong-Nam. "The first cyprinid fish and small mammal fossils from the Korean Peninsula." Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 24, no. 2 (2004): 489–93. http://dx.doi.org/10.1671/2273.
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Goswami, Anjali. "A dating success story: genomes and fossils converge on placental mammal origins." EvoDevo 3, no. 1 (2012): 18. http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/2041-9139-3-18.
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Steadman, David W., Jessica A. Oswald, and Ascanio D. Rincόn. "The diversity and biogeography of late Pleistocene birds from the lowland Neotropics." Quaternary Research 83, no. 3 (2015): 555–64. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.yqres.2015.02.001.
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The Neotropical lowlands sustain the world's richest bird communities, yet little that we know about their history is based on paleontology. Fossils afford a way to investigate distributional shifts in individual species, and thus improve our understanding of long-term change in Neotropical bird communities. We report a species-rich avian fossil sample from a late Pleistocene tar seep (Mene de Inciarte) in northwestern Venezuela. A mere 175 identified fossils from Mene de Inciarte represent 73 species of birds, among which six are extinct, and eight others no longer occur within 100 km. These 14 species consist mainly of ducks (Anatidae), snipe (Scolopacidae), vultures/condors (Vulturidae), hawks/eagles (Accipitridae), and blackbirds (Icteridae). Neotropical bird communities were richer in the late Pleistocene than today; their considerable extinction may be related to collapse of the large mammal fauna at that time. The species assemblage at Mene de Inciarte suggests that biogeographic patterns, even at continental scales, have been remarkably labile over short geological time frames. Mene de Inciarte is but one of 300 + tar seeps in Venezuela, only two of which have been explored for fossils. We may be on the cusp of an exciting new era of avian paleontology in the Neotropics.
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Vlachos, E., and E. Tsoukala. "Testudo cf. graeca from the new Late Miocene locality of Platania (Drama basin, N. Greece) and a reappraisal of previously published specimens." Bulletin of the Geological Society of Greece 48 (January 11, 2017): 27. http://dx.doi.org/10.12681/bgsg.11046.
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In this paper we describe a new Neogene mammalian site and one of the latest discoveries of a fossil tortoise in Greece, from Platania locality, in Drama basin, Northern Greece. The preliminary study of the numerous fossil mammal remains shows that the recovered fauna is of Late Miocene age. The tortoise material consists of a partial shell and a limb bone that belong to the same individual. They are attributed to the Testudo cf. graeca, and are members of the Testudo s.s. lineage, characterized by the presence of a hypo–xiphiplastral hinge. This new material indicates that the presence of T. graeca in Greece could expand into the Late Miocene. Comparisons with other fossils of the genus Testudo s.s. from Greece, allowed the revision of previously published specimens of T. graeca.
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Lyson, T. R., I. M. Miller, A. D. Bercovici, et al. "Exceptional continental record of biotic recovery after the Cretaceous–Paleogene mass extinction." Science 366, no. 6468 (2019): 977–83. http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aay2268.
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We report a time-calibrated stratigraphic section in Colorado that contains unusually complete fossils of mammals, reptiles, and plants and elucidates the drivers and tempo of biotic recovery during the poorly known first million years after the Cretaceous–Paleogene mass extinction (KPgE). Within ~100 thousand years (ka) post-KPgE, mammalian taxonomic richness doubled, and maximum mammalian body mass increased to near pre-KPgE levels. A threefold increase in maximum mammalian body mass and dietary niche specialization occurred at ~300 ka post-KPgE, concomitant with increased megafloral standing species richness. The appearance of additional large mammals occurred by ~700 ka post-KPgE, coincident with the first appearance of Leguminosae (the bean family). These concurrent plant and mammal originations and body-mass shifts coincide with warming intervals, suggesting that climate influenced post-KPgE biotic recovery.
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Steadman, David W., and Norton G. Miller. "California Condor Associated with Spruce-Jack Pine Woodland in the Late Pleistocene of New York." Quaternary Research 28, no. 3 (1987): 415–26. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0033-5894(87)90008-1.
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AbstractA humerus, coracoid, and pedal phalanx of the California Condor, Gymnogyps californianus, were recovered from the Hiscock Site in western New York, in an inorganic stratum containing wood that is 11,000 radiocarbon years old. Associated vertebrates include mastodont, wapiti, and caribou. Pollen and plant macrofossils from the sediments indicate a spruce-jack pine woodland and a local, herb-dominated wetland community. Historic records (all from western North America) and previous late Pleistocene fossils of the California Condor are associated mainly with warm-temperate climates and floras. The New York fossils show that this bird was able to live in a colder climate and in a boreal, coniferous setting at a time when appropriate food (large mammal carrion) was available. The California Condor, which survives only in captivity, has suffered a greater reduction in geographical range than previously suspected. Much of this reduction in range probably occurred ca. 11,000 yr B.P. when the extinction many North American large mammals resulted in severely reduced availability of food for the California Condor and other large scavenging birds.
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Sulej, Tomasz, Andrzej Wolniewicz, Niels Bonde, Błażej Błażejowski, Grzegorz Niedźwiedzki, and Mateusz Tałanda. "New perspectives on the Late Triassic vertebrates of East Greenland: preliminary results of a Polish−Danish palaeontological expedition." Polish Polar Research 35, no. 4 (2014): 541–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.2478/popore-2014-0030.
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Abstract The Fleming Fjord Formation (Jameson Land, East Greenland) documents a diverse assemblage of terrestrial vertebrates of Late Triassic age. Expeditions from the turn of the 21st century have discovered many important fossils that form the basis of our current knowledge of Late Triassic Greenlandic faunas. However, due to the scarcity and incompleteness of the fossils and their insufficient study, our understanding of the taxonomic diversity of the Fleming Fjord Formation is hindered. Here, we report the preliminary findings of a Polish-Danish expedition to the Fleming Fjord Formation that took place in 2014. Three areas were visited – the fairly well known MacKnight Bjerg and Wood Bjerg and the virtually unexplored Liasryggen. MacKnigth Bjerg and Liasryggen yielded fossils which promise to significantly broaden our knowledge of vertebrate evolution in the Late Triassic. Stem-mammal remains were discovered at Liasryggen. Other fossils found at both sites include remains of actinopterygians, sarcopterygians, temnospondyl amphibians and various archosaurs (including early dinosaurs). Numerous vertebrate trace fossils, including coprolites, pseudosuchian footprints, theropod and sauropodomorph dinosaur tracks, were also discovered. Newly discovered skeletal remains as well as abundant trace fossils indicate higher tetrapod diversity in the Late Triassic of Greenland than previously thought. Trace fossils also allow inferences of early theropod and sauropodomorph dinosaur behaviour.
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Czaplewski, Nicholas J. "First report of bats (Mammalia: Chiroptera) from the Gray Fossil Site (late Miocene or early Pliocene), Tennessee, USA." PeerJ 5 (April 27, 2017): e3263. http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.3263.
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Thousands of vertebrate fossils have been recovered from the Gray Fossil Site, Tennessee, dating to the Miocene-Pliocene boundary. Among these are but eight specimens of bats representing two different taxa referable to the family Vespertilionidae. Comparison of the fossils with Neogene and Quaternary bats reveals that seven of the eight specimens pertain to a species of Eptesicus that cannot be distinguished from recent North American Eptesicus fuscus. The remaining specimen, a horizontal ramus with m3, is from a smaller vespertilionid bat that cannot confidently be assigned to a genus. Although many vespertilionid genera can be excluded through comparisons, and many extinct named taxa cannot be compared due to nonequivalence of preserved skeletal elements, the second taxon shows morphological similarities to small-bodied taxa with three lower premolar alveoli, three distinct m3 talonid cusps, and m3 postcristid showing the myotodont condition. It resembles especially Nycticeius humeralis and small species of Eptesicus. Eptesicus cf. E. fuscus potentially inhabited eastern North America continuously since the late Hemphillian land mammal age, when other evidence from the Gray Fossil Site indicates the presence in the southern Appalachian Mountains of a warm, subtropical, oak-hickory-conifer forest having autochthonous North American as well as allochthonous biogeographical ties to eastern Asia and tropical-subtropical Middle America.
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Darroch, Simon A. F., Danielle Fraser, and Michelle M. Casey. "The preservation potential of terrestrial biogeographic patterns." Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 288, no. 1945 (2021): 20202927. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2020.2927.
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Extinction events in the geological past are similar to the present-day biodiversity crisis in that they have a pronounced biogeography, producing dramatic changes in the spatial distributions of species. Reconstructing palaeobiogeographic patterns from fossils therefore allows us to examine the long-term processes governing the formation of regional biotas, and potentially helps build spatially explicit models for future biodiversity loss. However, the extent to which biogeographic patterns can be preserved in the fossil record is not well understood. Here, we perform a suite of simulations based on the present-day distribution of North American mammals, aimed at quantifying the preservation potential of beta diversity and spatial richness patterns over extinction events of varying intensities, and after applying a stepped series of taphonomic filters. We show that taphonomic biases related to body size are the biggest barrier to reconstructing biogeographic patterns over extinction events, but that these may be compensated for by both the small mammal record preserved in bird castings, as well as range expansion in surviving species. Overall, our results suggest that the preservation potential of biogeographic patterns is surprisingly high, and thus that the fossil record represents an invaluable dataset recording the changing spatial distribution of biota over key intervals in Earth History.
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Lopes, Renato Pereira, and Jorge Ferigolo. "Post mortem modifications (pseudopaleopathologies) in middle-late Pleistocene mammal fossils from southern Brazil." REVISTA BRASILEIRA DE PALEONTOLOGIA 18, no. 2 (2015): 285–306. http://dx.doi.org/10.4072/rbp.2015.2.09.
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Scott, Eric, and Kathleen B. Springer. "First records ofCanis dirusandSmilodon fatalisfrom the late Pleistocene Tule Springs local fauna, upper Las Vegas Wash, Nevada." PeerJ 4 (June 21, 2016): e2151. http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/peerj.2151.
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Late Pleistocene groundwater discharge deposits (paleowetlands) in the upper Las Vegas Wash north of Las Vegas, Nevada, have yielded an abundant and diverse vertebrate fossil assemblage, the Tule Springs local fauna (TSLF). The TSLF is the largest open-site vertebrate fossil assemblage dating to the Rancholabrean North American Land Mammal Age in the southern Great Basin and Mojave Desert. Over 600 discrete body fossil localities have been recorded from the wash, including an area that now encompasses Tule Springs Fossil Beds National Monument (TUSK). Paleowetland sediments exposed in TUSK named the Las Vegas Formation span the last 250 ka, with fossiliferous sediments spanning ∼100–13 ka. The recovered fauna is dominated by remains ofCamelopsandMammuthus, and also includes relatively common remains of extinctEquusandBisonas well as abundant vertebrate microfaunal fossils. Large carnivorans are rare, with onlyPuma concolorandPanthera atroxdocumented previously. Postcranial remains assigned to the speciesCanis dirus(dire wolf) andSmilodon fatalis(sabre-toothed cat) represent the first confirmed records of these species from the TSLF, as well as the first documentation ofCanis dirusin Nevada and the only known occurrence ofSmilodonin southern Nevada. The size of the recovered canid fossil precludes assignment to other Pleistocene species ofCanis. The morphology of the felid elements differentiates them from other large predators such asPanthera,Homotherium, andXenosmilus, and the size of the fossils prevents assignment to other species ofSmilodon. The confirmed presence ofS. fatalisin the TSLF is of particular interest, indicating that this species inhabited open habitats. In turn, this suggests that the presumed preference ofS. fatalisfor closed-habitat environments hunting requires further elucidation.
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Hoffman, Georgia L., and Ruth A. Stockey. "Geological setting and paleobotany of the Joffre Bridge Roadcut fossil locality (Late Paleocene), Red Deer Valley, Alberta." Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 36, no. 12 (1999): 2073–84. http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/e99-095.
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The Joffre Bridge Roadcut locality (Paskapoo Formation) in south-central Alberta yields plant, mammal, fish, and insect fossils. A Late Paleocene (Tiffanian) age is indicated by mammalian fossils, supported by magnetostratigraphy and palynostratigraphy. This paper summarizes the flora (28 taxa have been identified to date) and describes the sedimentology to provide a paleoenvironmental context. Outcrops at the site are limited, but seven stratigraphic units are recognized and are interpreted to represent five environments of deposition: flood plain, fluvial channel, abandoned channel, swamp, and crevasse splay. The flood-plain mudstones lack identifiable plant material due to bioturbation and pedogenesis. They are capped by a thin, clay-rich paleosol with scattered vertebrate bones. An upward-fining sequence, interpreted as fluvial channel and channel abandonment sediments, rests directly on the paleosol and includes remains of riparian trees. Carbonaceous mudstone, interpreted as a swamp facies, includes remains of only five taxa (taxodiaceous conifers and riparian trees). Light-coloured mudstones on top of the swamp facies include a more diverse assemblage (aquatic and understory plants, taxodiaceous conifers, and riparian trees). Those beds are interpreted as the distal margin of an encroaching crevasse splay. Overlying sediments coarsen upward and are unfossiliferous, except for one occurrence of articulated fish skeletons from a mass-death event. The most productive beds for plant fossils are the top of the channel-abandonment sequence, the swamp horizon, and the base of the crevasse splay. Those beds have also yielded some insect, fish, and mammal remains.
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Burns, James A., and W. Bruce McGillivray. "A new prairie dog, Cynomys churcherii, from the Late Pleistocene of southern Alberta." Canadian Journal of Zoology 67, no. 11 (1989): 2633–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/z89-372.
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Excavation of fossil burrows in the Hand Hills, about 30 km northeast of Drumheller, Alberta, has produced over 3000 skeletal remains, including major portions of nine associated skeletons of a species of prairie dog (Cynomys) dating from 22 000 to 33 000 BP. All lower third molars possess the stylid feature characteristic of white-tailed prairie dogs (subgenus Leucocrossuromys). Similarly, the conformation of the zygomatic arch is peculiar to whitetails. Morphometric analyses based on 10 characters from 9 skulls and 6 characters from 22 mandibles show that the fossil population is significantly different from extant C. ludovicianus, C. leucurus, and C. gunnisoni. Skull length, a good measure of overall size, is significantly greater in the fossil population than in any Recent Cynomys species. The fossil localities are not montane sites typical of extant whitetail populations, and the fossil mammal community differs little from the modern assemblage expected in an aspen groveland in Alberta. The morphological distinctiveness of the fossils, plus the uncharacteristic (for whitetails) habitat association, suggest the erection of a new taxon, Cynomys churcherii n.sp.
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Wattinne, Aurélia, Christophe Lécuyer, Emmanuelle Vennin, Jean-Jacques Chateauneuf, and François Martineau. "Environmental changes around the Oligocene/Miocene boundary in the Limagne graben, Massif Central, France." BSGF - Earth Sciences Bulletin 189, no. 4-6 (2018): 19. http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/bsgf/2018019.
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Continental environments are very sensitive to climatic variations. A unique opportunity to study the climate changes around the Oligocene/Miocene boundary is offered by the Limagne graben Basin (France) where this stage boundary is well constrained by fossils. Indeed, some localities of the Limagne Graben Basin are so rich in mammal remains that they have become a European reference for mammal biostratigraphy. The dominant sedimentary facies of the lacustrine deposits in the northern part of the Limagne Graben Basin are composed of poorly cemented marls and calcarenites containing various plants and animals remains (e.g. algae, fish bones and teeth, gastropods, ostracods, mammals, birds and reptiles remains) associated with stromatolites. Mammal remains, well described in this area from the literature, were used to constrain the chronostratigraphic context of this lacustrine basin, with refinement thanks to new carbon and oxygen isotope measurements, palynological and sedimentological data. In this work, the available information obtained from a classical paleoecological study has been refined by new carbon and oxygen isotope analyses of carbonates and fish teeth retrieved from the washed sediment residues. The results of this study confirm that the Oligocene/Miocene boundary in Europe was a general period of aridity, associated with a cooler climate, which could be the cause of the decline in mammal paleodiversity observed during this period. The gradual evolution from brackish to fresh waters is indicated by the presence of ostracods and gastropods, and the major development of caddisflies. This period is associated to humid climatic conditions while a gradual increase in temperature took place throughout the second part of the Aquitanian. These environmental changes were driven by strong variations of temperatures and a contrasted seasonality.
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Lee, Michael S. Y. "Molecules, morphology, and the monophyly of diapsid reptiles." Contributions to Zoology 70, no. 1 (2001): 1–22. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/18759866-07001001.
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The morphological and molecular evidence for higher-level reptile relationships is reassessed. A combined analysis of 176 osteological, 40 soft anatomical, and 2903 (1783 aligned) molecular characters in 28 amniote taxa yields the traditional reptile tree. Synapsids (including mammals) are the sister taxon to all other amniotes, including all extant reptiles. Turtles group with anapsid parareptiles and fall outside a monophyletic Diapsida. Within diapsids, squamates and Sphenodon form a monophyletic Lepidosauria, and crocodiles plus birds form a monophyletic Archosauria. This tree is identical to the tree strongly supported by the osteological data alone when fossils are included. In a combined analysis the strong osteological signal linking turtles with anapsids is sufficient to override a soft anatomical signal placing turtles next to a heterodox archosaur-mammal clade, and a weaker molecular signal linking turtles with archosaurs. However, the turtle-archosaur clade cannot be statistically rejected. When fossils are ignored, the signal in the osteological data set disappears and, in a combined analysis of morphology and molecules, the molecular (turtle-archosaur) signal prevails. These results highlight the importance of fossils, not just in osteological studies, but even in “combined” analyses where they cannot be scored for the majority of characters (soft anatomy and molecules). Although the total number of molecular traits (2903) is much greater than the total number of morphological taits (216), when only characters informative at the relevant levels are considered, the two data sets are approximately equal in size. The partition homogeneity test yields unreliable results unless uninformative (invariant and autapomorphic) characters are excluded. Analyses of the mitochondrial data suggest that recent evidence from nuclear genes for a heterodox turtlecrocodile clade (excluding birds) might be an artefact of inadequate sampling of a diverse outgroup (mammals) and thus, problems with rooting the reptile tree.
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Erbajeva, M. A., A. A. Shchetnikov, A. Yu Kazansky, et al. "New pleistocene key section Ulan-Zhalga of the Western Transbaikalia." Доклады Академии наук 488, no. 3 (2019): 277–81. http://dx.doi.org/10.31857/s0869-56524883277-281.
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The currant paper presents the preliminary results of the multidisciplinary study of the new Pleistocene section Ulan-Zhalga (51°29′40.75″ С, 107°20′18.11″ В) discovered in the Western Transbauikalaia in 2017. On the base of the paleontological, paleomagmetic, and lithological data the early, middle and late Pleistocene sediments were recognized in the section. The analysis of the rich small mammal fossils resulted in to trace the paleoenvironmental and climatic changes in the region during the Quaternary. The unique alternation of the 19 faunistic horizons and 11 fossil soils in the whole section, the high correlation of the paleomagnetic and paleontological data allow us to refer the studied section Ulan-Zhalga to addition new late Cenozoic Key section of the south Eastern Siberia. The new geological and paleontological data would be important for paleogeographical reconstruction and biostratigraphic analysis.
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Marshall, Larry G., Richard L. Cifelli, Robert E. Drake, and Garniss H. Curtis. "Vertebrate paleontology, geology, and geochronology of the Tapera de López and Scarritt Pocket, Chubut Province, Argentina." Journal of Paleontology 60, no. 4 (1986): 920–51. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0022336000043080.
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Fossil land mammals were collected by G. G. Simpson in 1933–1934 at and near the Tapera de López in central Chubut Province, Patagonia, southern Argentina, from rocks now mapped as the Sarmiento Formation. These fossils are assigned to land mammal faunas of Casamayoran (Early Eocene), Mustersan (Middle Eocene), and Deseadan (late Early Oligocene through Early Miocene) age.40K-40Ar age determinations of eight basalt and two tuff units associated with the Deseadan age local fauna at Scarritt Pocket establish a geochronologic framework that calibrates the biostratigraphic record at this locality. The radioisotope dates obtained at Scarritt Pocket range from 23.4 Ma to about 21.0 Ma, and equate with earliest Miocene time. The Scarritt Pocket local fauna is the youngest dated Deseadan age fauna yet known in South America.Seven other localities have, or were reputed to have, local faunas of Deseadan age associated with dated volcanic units. Six of these localities are in Argentina (Gran Barranca, Cerro Blanco, Valle Hermoso, Pico Truncado, Cañadón Hondo, Quebrada Fiera de Malargüe) and one in Bolivia (Estratos Salla in the Salla-Luribay Basin). The stratigraphic relationships of the volcanic units with these local faunas is discussed, and the taxonomic content of each is reassessed.The Deseadan Land Mammal Age is defined by the earliest record of the land mammal genus Pyrotherium, which is from below a basalt dated at 33.6 Ma at Pico Truncado. Other early records of Pyrotherium occur below basalts dated at about 29 Ma at the Gran Barranca and Valle Hermoso, and from a 28.5 Ma level of the Estratos Salla. Thus, the lower boundary for Deseadan time is about 34 Ma.The youngest record of Pyrotherium is in the upper levels of the Estratos Salla dated at about 24 Ma. However, the Scarritt Pocket local fauna, which lacks Pyrotherium, permits placement of the upper boundary for Deseadan time at about 21.0 Ma. Late Deseadan time is surely, and the end of Deseadan time is apparently, marked by the last record of such groups as Proborhyaeninae (Proborhyaena), Rhynchippinae (Rhynchippus), Archaeohyracidae (Archaeohyrax), and the genera Platypittamys (Octodontidae), Scarrittia (Leontiniidae), Propachyrucos and Prohegetotherium (Hegetotheriidae), and Argyrohyrax (Interatheriidae), as these taxa are recorded in the Scarritt Pocket local fauna. Thus, Deseadan time extends from about 34.0 Ma to about 21.0 Ma, making it the Land Mammal Age with the longest known duration in South America.
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Clemens, William A. "Cf. Wortmania from the early Paleocene of Montana and an evaluation of the fossil record of the initial diversification of the Taeniodonta (Mammalia)." Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 50, no. 3 (2013): 341–54. http://dx.doi.org/10.1139/e2012-055.
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The Garbani Channel deposits, part of the Tullock Formation exposed in northeastern Montana, have yielded a large sample of vertebrates that probably lived during the Puercan 3 North American Land Mammal Age (NALMA). Four fossils in this sample — three isolated teeth and a medial phalanx — document the presence of a stylinodontid taeniodont, cf. Wortmania. Discovery of cf. Wortmania in the Tullock Formation extends the documented range of taeniodonts during Puercan 3 approximately 500 miles (800 km) northward from the San Juan Basin, New Mexico. Evaluation of the oldest records of taeniodonts, from the Lancian, Puercan, and Torrejonian NALMAs, highlights biases warranting future research. Recent phylogenetic analyses that resulted in numerous ghost lineages indicate that the available fossil record is far from complete. They open the possibility that the origin and initial radiation of taeniodonts occurred in areas yet to be sampled and their first occurrences might reflect immigration of invasive species. The available fossil record of taeniodonts is biased with significantly more abundant and complete specimens discovered in the San Juan Basin than at localities to the north. This bias is also apparent in the available samples of two other lineages of large Puercan mammals, the multituberculate Taeniolabis and the “triisodontid” Eoconodon. Where they occur, taeniodonts are relatively rare members of any local fauna. Is their rarity a product of an ecological bias or a reflection of decreasing population size related to increasing body size?
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Bright, Jen A., Bruce H. Tiffney, and André R. Wyss. "A mid-Oligocene (Whitneyan) rhinocerotid from northeastern California." Journal of Paleontology 89, no. 1 (2015): 135–39. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/jpa.2014.11.
Full textAbstract:
AbstractRhinoceroses were important in North American mammal faunas from the late middle Eocene to the Miocene, but the group’s poor sampling outside the High Plains and eastern Rocky Mountain regions during their early evolution significantly hinders understanding of their biogeography. This limited geographic sampling is particularly true of early–middle Oligocene time, with the vast majority of Whitneyan localities occurring in the White River Badlands of South Dakota. Thus, any rhinocerotid from outside the High Plains during this period is significant. We describe two new rhinocerotid specimens from the middle Oligocene Steamboat Formation of the northeastern Warner Mountains of California. Although the Steamboat Formation is well known for fossil plants, this is the first report of mammalian fossils from the area: an isolated lower molar recovered in 1974 but not previously described or illustrated, and a mandibular fragment recovered approximately 20 years later and bearing two molar teeth, most likely pertaining to the same taxon and horizon. The lack of distinctive morphological characters suggests both fossils be conservatively referred to Rhinocerotidae incertae sedis. Based on published tooth measurement data, Trigonias osborni represents the closest size match, but that species is currently only known from the Chadronian. Similarly, the Whitneyan taxon Diceratherium tridactylum is approximately the right size, but is currently only known from the High Plains and its presence in California would expand its geographic range substantially. Of greatest importance here is that sediments of the eastern Warner Mountains may represent a largely unexplored locale for early–middle Oligocene fossil vertebrates, and may yield important future finds.
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Davis, Brian, Richard Cifelli, and Guillermo Rougier. "A preliminary report of the fossil mammals from a new microvertebrate locality in the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation, Grand County, Utah." Geology of the Intermountain West 5 (February 7, 2018): 1–8. http://dx.doi.org/10.31711/giw.v5.pp1-8.
Full textAbstract:
The first Mesozoic mammals in North America were discovered in the Morrison Formation during the closing decades of the 19th century, as by-products of dinosaurs quarried by teams led by O.C. Marsh. These tiny fossils served as foundational specimens for our understanding of Mesozoic mammal evolution. There are now nearly 25 mammal-bearing localities known from the Morrison Formation, distributed across the Western Interior from the Black Hills to southern Colorado and west into Utah; the most historically important of these are in Wyoming (e.g., Como Quarry 9). Most Morrison mammals are known by jaws or jaw fragments, and several important Mesozoic groups (e.g., docodonts, dryolestoids, and to a large extent triconodonts and symmetrodonts) were established based on Morrison material, shaping the perception of mammalian diversity on a global scale. Despite heavy sampling of coeval sites elsewhere, the Morrison remains the most systematically diverse (at high taxonomic levels) assemblage of Jurassic mammals in the world. Here, we describe two mammalian specimens and highlight other remains yet to be fully identified from a new microvertebrate locality in the Morrison Formation of eastern Grand County, Utah. The site is positioned low in the Brushy Basin Member and is similar in lithology and stratigraphic level to the famous small vertebrate localities of the Fruita Paleontological Area, located less than 50 km to the northeast. In addition to small archosaurs and squamates, limited excavation to date has yielded at least 20 mammalian specimens representing a minimum of six taxa, several of which are new and quite different from typical Morrison taxa. Preservation is generally excellent and includes partially articulated cranial and postcranial elements of small vertebrates. This new site has great potential to contribute new taxa and more complete morphological data than typical Morrison localities, underscoring the importance of continued field work in the Morrison.
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Davis, Brian M., Richard L. Cifelli, and Guillermo W. Rougier. "A preliminary report of the fossil mammals from a new microvertebrate locality in the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation, Grand County, Utah." Geology of the Intermountain West 5 (June 1, 2018): 1–8. http://dx.doi.org/10.31711/giw.v5i0.17.
Full textAbstract:
The first Mesozoic mammals in North America were discovered in the Morrison Formation during the closing decades of the 19th century, as by-products of dinosaurs quarried by teams led by O.C. Marsh. These tiny fossils served as foundational specimens for our understanding of Mesozoic mammal evolution. There are now nearly 25 mammal-bearing localities known from the Morrison Formation, distributed across the Western Interior from the Black Hills to southern Colorado and west into Utah; the most historically important of these are in Wyoming (e.g., Como Quarry 9). Most Morrison mammals are known by jaws or jaw fragments, and several important Mesozoic groups (e.g., docodonts, dryolestoids, and to a large extent triconodonts and symmetrodonts) were established based on Morrison material, shaping the perception of mammalian diversity on a global scale. Despite heavy sampling of coeval sites elsewhere, the Morrison remains the most systematically diverse (at high taxonomic levels) assemblage of Jurassic mammals in the world. Here, we describe two mammalian specimens and highlight other remains yet to be fully identified from a new microvertebrate locality in the Morrison Formation of eastern Grand County, Utah. The site is positioned low in the Brushy Basin Member and is similar in lithology and stratigraphic level to the famous small vertebrate localities of the Fruita Paleontological Area, located less than 50 km to the northeast. In addition to small archosaurs and squamates, limited excavation to date has yielded at least 20 mammalian specimens representing a minimum of six taxa, several of which are new and quite different from typical Morrison taxa. Preservation is generally excellent and includes partially articulated cranial and postcranial elements of small vertebrates. This new site has great potential to contribute new taxa and more complete morphological data than typical Morrison localities, underscoring the importance of continued field work in the Morrison.
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Bastos, Ana Carolina Fortes, and Lílian Paglarelli Bergqvist. "A postura locomotora de Protolipterna ellipsodontoides Cifelli, 1983 (Mammalia: Litopterna: Protolipternidae) da Bacia de São José de Itaboraí, Rio de Janeiro (Paleoceno superior)." Anuário do Instituto de Geociências 30, no. 1 (2007): 58–66. http://dx.doi.org/10.11137/2007_1_58-66.
Full textAbstract:
The Litopterna is a group of endemic South America ungulates that lived from Late Paleocene (Itaboraiense) to Late Pleistocene (Lujanense). The order is divided in two large groups based on dental features: the Bunolipterna, in which the Protolipternidae is placed, is composed by taxa with primitive bunodont teeth; and the Lopholipterna, grouping taxa with derived lophodont teeth. In both the postcranial morphology is derived and uniform since the early forms. The Itaborai Basin, located at São José district, Itaboraí city, Rio de Janeiro state, is filled with different kinds of limestones, cut vertically by fissure fill deposits, where most of the fossils were collected. Protolipterna ellipsodontoides was described in 1983 based on dental features, but later postcranial bones were associated to this species. The main goal of this article is to infer the foot posture of P. ellipsodontoides. The material studied consists of femora, astragali, calcanea and metatarsals III, comprising 165 bones. All fossils were deposited in the fossil mammal collection of Departamento Nacional da Produção Mineral, in Rio de Janeiro state, Brasil. The methodology employed consisted of 15 linear and curvilinear measurements, which were submitted to a multivariate analysis (Principal Component Analysis -PCA and Discriminant Function Analysis -DFA). The results suggested a digitigrade posture to P. ellipsodontoides. Other morphological features of the skeleton, associated with a digitigrades posture, are suggestive of a cursorial locomotion, but with probable saltatory habits.
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Macfadden, Bruce J., and James L. Dobie. "Late Miocene three-toed horse Protohippus (Mammalia, Equidae) from southern Alabama." Journal of Paleontology 72, no. 1 (1998): 149–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0022336000024082.
Full textAbstract:
Dental and postcranial remains of a donkey-sized, three-toed, primitive horse were collected from the “Undifferentiated Miocene” Ecor Rouge Sand (which underlies the widespread Citronelle Formation) from the Mauvilla site in southern Alabama. These fossils probably pertain to a single individual of Protohippus gidleyi Hulbert, 1988. This represents an exceedingly rare occurrence of a late Tertiary land mammal from the central Gulf Coastal Plain and allows comparisons with better-known, contemporaneous land-mammal assemblages from Florida. Based on the known biochronology of Protohippus gidleyi from other localities, and the stratigraphic position of the Mauvilla record, the age of: 1) the Ecor Rouge Sand is late Miocene (latest Clarendonian to early Hemphillian landmammal “age”), between 9.0 to 6.5 Ma; and 2) the overlying Citronelle Formation near its type locality in southern Alabama is therefore late Miocene or younger.