In Depth Elasmotherium is one of the a typical animals that represents Pleistocene era fauna, though there has been a lot of debate over not only how it lived but what it really looked like One problematic area concerning the study of Elasmotherium is the actual morphology of the genus. Some reconstructions consider Elasmotherium to … Read more
In Depth Further Reading -Nuevas aportaciones al conocimiento de Coelodonta antiquitatis (Blumenbach, 1799) de Brown Bank, Mar del Norte [New contributions to the knowledge of Coelodonta antiquitatis (Blumenbach, 1799) Brown Bank, North Sea] – Bulletin Centre d’Est. Natura B-N. VII 13): 309-329 Sta. Coloma de Gramenet – David Garcia Fern�ndez & Juan Vicente i Castells … Read more
In Depth Like with Pliopithecus, the genus after which it was named, Propliopithecus was a gibbon-like ape that lived in Northeast Africa during the early Oligocene (back in this time Egypt had an extensive covering of vegetation unlike the arid desert conditions that we know today). Propliopithecus would have lived in the tree canopy where … Read more
In Depth Dilophodelphis is a genus of river dolphin that lived during the Miocene. The genus name means two crested delphis (delphis being a reference to the dolphin family). This is because the skull of Dilophodelphis has two crests of bone. Further Reading - A new fossil dolphin Dilophodelphis fordycei provides insight into the evolution … Read more
In Depth Further Reading – A new record of giant short-faced bear, Arctodus simus, from western North America with a re-evaluation of its paleobiology. – Contributions in Science, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County 371:1-12. – S. D. Emslie & N. J. Czaplewski – 1985. – The short-faced bear Arctodus simus from the late … Read more
In Depth Further Reading - Nachweis des Jaguars (Panthera onca gombaszoegensis) aus dem sp�ten Unter- oder fr�hen Mittelpleistoz�n der Niederlande. - Deinsea, Annual of the Natural History Museum Rotterdam. P. 47-57. - H. Hemmer & R.-D Kahlke - 2005. - New record of the European jaguar, Panthera onca gombaszoegensis (Kretzoi, 1938), from the Plio-Pleistocene of … Read more
In Depth Discovered in 1972 by Dimitar Kovachev, Kalimantsia did not get named until 2001. Although based upon the description of a skull, Kalimantsia is known to have had a shorter snout than many other known chalicotheres, something that might suggest a foraging specialisation in tougher types of vegetation that required a stronger bite (an … Read more
In Depth The discovery of Fruitafossor made many palaeontologists sit up and pay attention, because here was a digging mammal that existed one hundred million years before the previously known Cenozoic ancestors of today’s mammalian diggers. Although it appears that Fruitafossor was not related to any of today’s existing mammals, it employed its powerful forearms, … Read more
In Depth A relative of the better known Diacodexis, Indohyus has been speculated to be a member of a group of mammals that were possibly related to the mammals whose descendants would eventually go on to become the whales. This stems back to study of Indohyus which revealed that it had bones denser than most … Read more
In Depth Heishanobaatar is a genus of multituberculatan mammal that lived in China during the early Cretaceous. Further Reading - New multituberculate mammals from the Lower Cretaceous (Shahai and Fuxin formations), northeastern China. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 30(5):1501-1514. - N. Kusuhashi, Y. Hu, T. Setoguchi & H. Matsuoka - 2010.