Discovery of the fossil otter Enhydritherium terraenovae (Carnivora, Mammalia) in Mexico reconciles a palaeozoogeographic mystery
Por:
Tseng, Z. Jack, Pacheco-Castro, Adolfo, Carranza-Castaneda, Oscar, Jorge Aranda-Gomez, Jose, Wang, Xiaoming, Troncoso, Hilda
Publicada:
1 jun 2017
Categoría:
Agricultural and biological sciences (miscellaneous)
Resumen:
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.
Filiaciones:
Univ Buffalo, Dept Pathol & Anat Sci, Jacobs Sch Med & Biomed Sci, Buffalo, NY 14214 USA
Nat Hist Museum Los Angeles Cty, Dept Vertebrate Paleontol, 900 Exposit Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90007 USA
Amer Museum Nat Hist, Div Paleontol, Cent Pk West & 79th St, New York, NY 10024 USA
Univ Nacl Autonoma Mexico, Ctr Geociencias, Blvd Juriquilla 3001, Juriquilla 76230, Queretaro, Mexico
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