#cenozoic

[makairodonx]

A lone mother Homotherium latidens, against all odds, does her best to keep her tiny cub safe from the blizzards that sweep across the Siberian wilderness so that she will not suffer the bitter fates that await the other Homotherium cubs that don’t survive the long winter.

[paleoart]

I just realized that apparently I never shared this series here on Tumblr??  

I call it Living Paintings, as they are recreations of extinct animals that some artists actually saw and painted from memory, a long time ago.

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[sticksandsharks]

little cenozoic guys

(hyaenodon, langstonia, smilodon, dromornithidae, stegotetrabelodon, glyptodon, moropus)

[atomic-chronoscaph]

Animals of the Primeval World - art by Heinrich Harder (c. 1910)

[the-dragon-girl-27]

Flocking drawings!

Balaur just sitting around

Megalania taking a bath

Styracosaurus looking at the sunset

a pair of Euparkerias nuzzling

[alex-fictus]

Cats, cats cats, cats cats!

The first recognizable cat, Proailurus, is from around 25 million years ago, and that began a long history for our feline friends!

Proailurus American Cheetah - American Lion Homotherium - Smilodon

Planned: Dinictus

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[sleepysaurus4]

Eocene, so familiar yet so different

[pleistocene-pride]

Antrostomus vociferous, better known as the eastern whip-poor-will or whip o whill, is a species of bird within the nightjar family, Caprimulgidae, which is endemic to the deciduous forests and mixed woodlands of North and Central America from Canada in the north to Costa Rica in the south and from the east coast to the great plains. Often migrating to the north of there range to breed and to the south of there range to overwinter. It is named onomatopoeically after its song as whilst the whip-poor-will is commonly heard within its range, it is rarely seen because of its elaborate camouflage. Eastern whip-poor-whills are a nocturnal species which spends there days resting amongst leaf litter, tree roots, branches, hollows, and fallen logs, emerging at night to feed upon various flying insects such as beetles, flies, mosquitos, and in particular moths. Eastern whip-poor-wills are generally solitary preferring to spend time on their own; however, during migration, they may form loose flocks. Reaching around 8.5 to 10.5 inches (22 to 27cms) in length, 1.5 to 3 ounces (42 to 85grams) in weight with a 17.5 to 19.5 inch (45 to 50cms) wingspan, eastern whip poor whills sport a large head and broad body. They have mottled camoflauged plumage: the upperparts are grey, black and brown; the lower parts are grey and black. They have a very short bill and a black throat. Males have a white patch below the throat and white tips on the outer tail feathers; in the female, these parts are light brown. Breeding often begins in March, with pairs meeting up and building a loose nest on the ground, in shaded locations among dead leaves. Here a female will usually lay 2 eggs at a time. Incubation lasts 19-21 days performed by both parents. Eastern Whip-poor-wills lay their eggs in phase with the lunar cycle, so that they hatch on average 10 days before a full moon. As when the moon is near full, the adults can better forage at night and capture large quantities of insects to feed to their young.The chicks hatch well developed covered in down but with their eyes closed. They are fed and protected by both parents and start to fly at the age of 20 days. Eastern whip-poor-wills usually produce 1 or 2 broods per year and females may lay a second clutch while the male is still caring for chicks from the first brood. Under ideal conditions an eastern whip poor will can live up to 15 years.

[arminreindl]

Eocene gators and Miocene gharials

It's been a busy two-ish weeks for me once again with two "new" crocodilians dropping not even a week apart. These two newcommers couldn't be any more different, as you'll see soon enough.

The first of the two is not exactly a stranger, in more than one way. Sutekhsuchus dowsoni in truth has been known since 1920, when it was described as Tomistoma dowsoni based on fossils from Wadi Moghra in Egypt. Tomistoma being one of those genera that was a popular wastebasket for crocs. Broad snout and overbite? Alligator. Narrow snout? Tomistoma. Everything else? Crocodylus.

Tomistoma is still heavily affected by that, with the paper still referencing about half a dozen species of Tomistoma that are almost definitely not Tomistoma. In that regard, tho its not super new its fantastic to see that one of these Miocene circum-mediterranean forms finally gets its due (especially after having been unceremoniously been lumped into T. lusitanica for a while). Additional fun fact, the original "missinterpretation" as a species of Tomistoma is used as the basis for the new name, basically meaning "Set's crocodile" in reference to Sutekh/Set being god of deception.

Left: Sutekhsuchus by @paleomiguel Right: Sutekhsuchus by @manusuchus Go give them a follow

Another way in which Sutekhsuchus is not "new new" is that, intentional or not, the name was actually dropped a month ago without many people noticing. As has been pointed out to me by @paleomiguel, a recent paper on Eogavialis featured a phylogeny that contained Sutekhsuchus, a name I was not familiar with. However, the species name did ring a bell and after a brief search on google scholar I did find a reference to the then unpublished redescription.

Anyways, background aside Sutekhsuchus has some cool stuff going for it. Its anatomy is in some regards intermediate between the modern false gharial (which the paper regards as one of the basalmost gavialoids) and the Indian gharial (a highly derived weirdo). Ultimately, its just one of several species that lived around the broader Tethys Sea during the Miocene as part of a flourishing croc ecosystem. Given the warmer temperatures, it was in pretty good company. We know it from Gebel Zelten and Wadi Moghra, both of which preserve the bones of the robust Rimasuchus and the bizarre Euthecodon, both members of the Osteolaemines ("dwarf crocodiles", a name that makes more sense when you ignore these fossil forms). Both localities are interpreted as being somewhat coastal, consisting of lagoons, estuaries, slow moving rivers and surrounding forests.

Left: Rimasuchus attacking Zygolophodon by Michael Tripoli Right: Euthecodon arambourgi by yours truly

The other new crocodilian was much more of a surprise to me personally. Ahdeskatanka russlanddeutsche is a species of basal alligatorine from the Eocene of North Dakota. The genus name derives from the Dakota word for alligator, the species name references ethnic Germans that settled the region after emmigrating from the Russian Empire.

Ahdeskatanka via Cossette & Tarailo

It lived during the early Eocene in the Golden Valley Formation of North Dakota and in many regards resembles many early alligators of the time, having been small with a short and blunt snout and globular teeth well suited for crushing hard shelled prey.

During this time period North Dakota experienced the Early Eocene Climatic Optimum, an exceptional warm period that saw lush subtropical to tropical forests grow along the banks of meandering rivers and extensive swamps. Not great for mammalian carnivores but fantastic for crocodilians, of which there were plenty. The Golden Valley was home to at least 4. In addition to Ahdeskatanka there was a similar, possibly closely related unnamed form, a large crocodyloid similar to the ubiquitous Borealosuchus and the large caiman Chrysochampsa, a relic of a Cretaceous offshoot of the family.

Left: Borealosuchus by Wayne Hsieh Right: Chrysochampsa via Cossette & Tarailo

As always, here the respective Wikipedia pages and relevant publications

Sutekhsuchus: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sutekhsuchus https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14772019.2024.2384548

Ahdeskatanka: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahdeskatanka https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02724634.2024.2403579

[teethands]

little snapshots of a mod i have been working on for a few days, cenozoicraft, understandably based around adding cenozoic animals to the minecraft world along with neolithic tools. its heavily based around hunting and utilizing animal parts. most of what is here is tamable and rideable with fun little taming mechanics, so dont expect to be able to waltz up to a smilodon. more to come soon

[knuppitalism-with-ue]

After these lanky ones I felt like I needed a chonky one.

Paramylodon fits that description.

[makairodonx]

It’s time to give the animals of the Cenozoic a day in the limelight…

[paleoart]

"And as he stares into the sky, there are twice as many stars as usual"

Macrauchenia born with polycephaly, inspired by the poem "The Two-Headed Calf" by Laura Gilpin.

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[leaping-laelaps-art]

The archeocete Perucetus colossus dives through a coastal bloom of jellyfish in the Pisco Basin (southern Peru), some time during the Eocene (with bonus multiview).

I originally intended to add epibionts to this reconstruction (reflecting the specialized communities found on many living whales, especially baleen whales). Yet, interestingly, it appears that most animal epibionts and ectoparasites of modern cetaceans, such as whale barnacles (Hayashi et al. 2013) and remoras (Friedman et al. 2013), only appeared in the Neogene or late Paleogene, or have a poorly known (co-)evolutionary history, like whale lice (Pfeiffer 2009, Iwasa-Arai & Serejo 2018) and pennellids (large parasitic copepods) (Hermosilla et al. 2015). So, no epibionts* for big lad Perucetus!

References and notes about the reconstruction:

*animal epibionts. Unicellular eukaryotes like diatoms were most likely present on early cetaceans, given their prevalence on modern large marine animals (Ashworth et al. 2022). Of course, it is possible that other animals (i.e., early, less specialized representatives of modern groups, or different taxa altogether) were also already exploiting the surfaces offered by these early whales; however, this remains entirely speculative.

The reconstruction of Perucetus proposed in its original description (Bianucci et al. 2023) includes some rather odd (if interesting) choices about soft tissues, including limbs with webbed and distinguishable fingers, and a manatee-like tail. While these choices might be defendable in light of the rather basal status of Perucetus among cetaceans, I opted for a more derived look based on the assumption that fully marine cetaceans like basilosaurids would have probably rapidly acquired hydrodynamically favorable adaptations, pushing them towards a more familiar Neoceti-like appearance (even though Perucetus itself was likely a poor swimmer (Bianucci et al. 2023), it seems likely to me that this was a secondarily acquired trait, given the less extreme morphology of other basilosaurids).

Reconstruction in the multiview scaled to ~18 m in length after the estimations of Bianucci et al. (2023).

References:

Ashworth, M. P., Majewska, R., Frankovich, T. A., Sullivan, M., Bosak, S., Filek, K., Van de Vijver, B., Arendt, M., Schwenter, J., Nel, R., Robinson, N. J., Gary, M. P., Theriot, E. C., Stacy, N. I., Lam, D. W., Perrault, J. R., Manire, C. A., & Manning, S. R. (2022). Cultivating epizoic diatoms provides insights into the evolution and ecology of both epibionts and hosts. Scientific Reports, 12(1), Article 1. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-19064-0

Bianucci, G., Lambert, O., Urbina, M., Merella, M., Collareta, A., Bennion, R., Salas-Gismondi, R., Benites-Palomino, A., Post, K., de Muizon, C., Bosio, G., Di Celma, C., Malinverno, E., Pierantoni, P. P., Villa, I. M., & Amson, E. (2023). A heavyweight early whale pushes the boundaries of vertebrate morphology. Nature, 620(7975), Article 7975. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06381-1

Friedman, M., Johanson, Z., Harrington, R. C., Near, T. J., & Graham, M. R. (2013). An early fossil remora (Echeneoidea) reveals the evolutionary assembly of the adhesion disc. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 280(1766), 20131200. https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2013.1200

Hayashi, R., Chan, B. K. K., Simon-Blecher, N., Watanabe, H., Guy-Haim, T., Yonezawa, T., Levy, Y., Shuto, T., & Achituv, Y. (2013). Phylogenetic position and evolutionary history of the turtle and whale barnacles (Cirripedia: Balanomorpha: Coronuloidea). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, 67(1), 9–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ympev.2012.12.018

Hermosilla, C., Silva, L. M. R., Prieto, R., Kleinertz, S., Taubert, A., & Silva, M. A. (2015). Endo- and ectoparasites of large whales (Cetartiodactyla: Balaenopteridae, Physeteridae): Overcoming difficulties in obtaining appropriate samples by non- and minimally-invasive methods. International Journal for Parasitology: Parasites and Wildlife, 4(3), 414–420. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijppaw.2015.11.002

Pfeiffer, C. J. (2009). Whale Lice. In W. F. Perrin, B. Würsig, & J. G. M. Thewissen (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Marine Mammals (Second Edition) (pp. 1220–1223). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-373553-9.00279-0

[vhsdogs]

some cenozoic beasties + closeups :]

[the-dragon-girl-27]

Flocking doodles

Maiasaura watching over her hatchlings

Sigilmassasaurus fighting for territory

Boreaspis swimmin round

Gigantopithecus yeeting another Gigantopithecus to assert dominance