0000000000303646
AUTHOR
María Ríos
First occurrence of Sivatherium Falconer and Cautley, 1836 (Mammalia, Ruminantia, Giraffidae) in the Iberian Peninsula
he sivatherine clade includes some of the largest giraffids and emerged during the late Miocene. Sivatherium hendeyi, the earliest known species of the Sivatherium genus, was first described from the lower Pliocene of Langebaanweg (5.15 ± 0.1 Ma, Cape Province, South Africa). Here we describe the first possible occurrence of Sivatherium from western Europe from the lower Pliocene (MN14) of Puerto de la Cadena (4.9 Ma, Murcia, Spain). The new material consists of dental and postcranial remains. The Puerto de la Cadena Sivatherium, together with the presence of Macaca sp. and Debruijnimys sp., indicates a connection between African and European faunas during the early Pliocene and a possible …
Review of paleo-humidity parameters in fossil rodents (Mammalia): Isotopic vs. tooth morphology approach
Paleoecology of fossil rodents is frequently inferred from the dental pattern of the teeth, attributing the habitat conditions of extant rodents to fossil species with similar dental pattern. This technique is common practice and has been in use for several decades. A relatively new technique is based on the carbon and oxygen isotope composition of the incisor enamel of fossil rodents to reconstruct paleoenvironmental scenarios. We combine these two methods, studying material from two Early Miocene Spanish sections, one in the Mediterranean coastal area and one in Northcentral inland Spain. Comparison of the humidity values obtained by means of these two proxies reveals discrepancies. There…