Spoochelys ormondea gen. et sp. nov., an archaic meiolaniid-like turtle from the early cretaceous of Lightning Ridge, Australia

Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology

Volumn , Issue 9789400743083, 2013, Pages 121-146

  Smith, Elizabeth T ^a,b   Kear, Benjamin P ^c  

^a UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES   (Australia)

^b Australian Opal Centre   (Australia)

^c UPPSALA UNIVERSITY   (Sweden)

Author keywords

Albian; Gondwana; High paleolatitude; Meiolaniidae; Relict taxon; Terrestrial

Indexed keywords

EID: 85045428115     PISSN: 18779077     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book Series    
DOI: 10.1007/978-94-007-4309-0_9     Document Type: Chapter

References (104)

1. Agnolin, F. L., Ezcurra, M. D., Pais, D. F., & Salisbury, S. W. (2010). A reappraisal of the Cretaceous non-avian dinosaur faunas from Australia and New Zealand: Evidence for their Gondwanan affinities. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, 8, 257–300.
2. Ameghino, F. (1899). Sinopsis geologico-paleontologica. Supplemen-to (adiciones y correcciones). La Plata, Julio de, pp. 1–13.
3. Angnarsson, I., & Miller, J. A. (2008). Is ACCTRAN better than DELTRAN? Cladistics, 24, 1032–1038.
4. Anquetin, J., Barrett, P. M., Jones, M. E., Moore-Fay, S., & Evans, S. E. (2009). New stem turtle from the Middle Jurassic of Scotland: New insights into the evolution and palaeoecology of basal turtles. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B, 276, 879–886.
5. Archer, M., Flannery, T. F., Ritchie, A., & Molnar, R. E. (1985). First Mesozoic mammal from Australia—an Early Cretaceous mono-treme. Nature, 318(6044), 363–366.
6. Baur, G. (1887). Ueber den Ursprung der Extremitaeten der Ichthy-opterygia. Bericht des Oberrheinischen Geologischen Vereins, 20, 17–20.
7. Brinkman, D. B., & Peng, J. H. (1993). Ordosemys leios, n. gen., n. sp., a new turtle from the Early Cretaceous of the Ordos Basin, Inner Mongolia. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 30, 2128–2138.
8. Brinkman, D. B., & Wu, X.-C. (1999). The skull of Ordosemys, an Early Cretaceous turtle from Inner Mongolia, People’s Republic of China, and the interrelationships of Eucryptodira (Chelonia, Cryptodira). Paludicola, 2, 134–137.
9. Brinkman, D., Eberth, D., Xu, X., Clark, J., & Wu, X.-C. (2012). Turtles from the Jurassic Shishugou Formation of the Junggar Basin, People’s Republic of China, with comments on the basicranial region of basal eucryptodires. In D. B. Brinkman, P. A. Holroyd & J. D. Gardner (Eds.) Morphology and evolution of turtles. Dordrecht: Springer.
10. Burger, D. (1980). Palynology of the lower Cretaceous Surat Basin. Bureau of Mineral Resources, Geology and Geophysics Bulletin, 189, 1–106.
11. Clarke, J. M., & Middleton, K. M. (2008). Mosaicism, modules, and the evolution of birds: Results from a Bayesian approach to the study of morphological evolution using discrete character data. Systematic Biology, 57, 185–201.
12. Clemens, W. A., Wilson, G. P., & Molnar, R. E. (2003). An enigmatic (synapsid?) tooth from the Early Cretaceous of New South Wales, Australia. Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology, 23, 232–237.
13. Datta, P. M., Manna, P., Ghosh, S. C., & Das, P. (2000). The first Jurassic turtle from India. Palaeontology, 43, 99–109.
14. de la Fuente, M. S., & Iturralde-Vinent, M. (2001). A new pleurodiran turtle from the Jagua Formation (Oxfordian) of Western Cuba. Journal of Paleontology, 75, 860–869.
15. De Lapparent de Broin, F., & Molnar, R. E. (2001). Eocene chelid turtles from Redbank Plains, southeast Queensland, Australia. Geodiversitas, 23, 41–79.
16. Dettmann, M. E., Molnar, R. E., Douglas, J. G., Burger, D., Fielding, C., Clifford, H. T., et al. (1992). Australian Cretaceous terrestrial faunas and floras: Biostratigraphic and biogeographic implications. Cretaceous Research, 13, 207–262.
17. Felsenstein, J. (2004). Inferring phylogenies. Sunderland: Sinauer Associates, Inc.
18. Fernandez, M. S., & de la Fuente, M. S. (1994). Redescription and phylogenetic position of Notoemys: The oldest Gondwanian pleurodiran turtle. Neues Jahrbuch Geologie und Palaeontologie Abhandlungen Stuttgart, 193, 81–105.
19. Flannery, T. F., Archer, M., Rich, T. H., & Jones, R. (1995). A new family of monotremes from the Cretaceous of Australia. Nature, 377, 418–420.
20. Fraas, E. (1913). Proterochersis, eine pleurodire Schildkroete aus dem Keuper. Jahreshefte der Gesellschaft fur Naturkunde in Wurttemberg, 69, 13–90.
21. Gaffney, E. S. (1979a). Comparative cranial morphology of recent and fossil turtles. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 164, 65–376.
22. Gaffney, E. S. (1979b). The Jurassic turtles of North America. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 162, 91–136.
23. Gaffney, E. S. (1983). The cranial morphology of the extinct horned turtle Meiolania platyceps, from the Pleistocene of Lord Howe Island, Australia. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 175, 361–480.
24. Gaffney, E. S. (1985). The cervical and caudal vertebrae of the cryptodiran turtle, Meiolania platyceps, from the Pleistocene of Lord Howe Island, Australia. American Museum Novitates, 2805, 1–29.
25. Gaffney, E. S. (1990). The comparative osteology of the Triassic turtle Proganochelys. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 194, 1–263.
26. Gaffney, E. S. (1992). Ninjemys, a new name for ‘‘Meiolania’’ owenii (Woodward), a horned turtle from the Pleistocene of Queensland. American Museum Novitates, 3049, 1–10.
27. Gaffney, E. S. (1996). The postcranial morphology of Meiolania platyceps and a review of the Meiolaniidae. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 229, 1–165.
28. Gaffney, E. S., & Jenkins, F. A. (2010). The cranial morphology of Kayentachelys, an early Jurassic cryptodire, and the early history of turtles. Zoologica Scripta, 91, 335–368.
29. Gaffney, E. S., & Kitching, J. W. (1994). The most ancient African turtle. Nature, 369, 55–58.
30. Gaffney, E. S., & McNamara, G. (1990). A meiolaniid turtle from the Pleistocene of northern Queensland. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum, 28, 107–113.
31. Gaffney, E. S., & Meylan, P. A. (1988). A phylogeny of turtles. In M. J. Benton (Ed.), The phylogeny and classification of the tetrapods.Volume 1. Amphibians, reptiles, birds (pp. 157–219). Oxford: Clarendon Press.
32. Gaffney, E. S., & Ye, X. (1992). Dracochelys, a new cryptodiran turtle from the Early Cretaceous age. American Museum Novitates, 3048, 1–13.
33. Gaffney, E. S., Balouet, J. C., & de Broin, F. (1984). New occurrences of extinct meiolaniid turtles from New Caledonia. American Museum Novitates, 2800, 1–6.
34. Gaffney, E. S., Hutchinson, J. H., Jenkins, F. A., & Meeker, L. (1987). Modern turtle origins: the oldest known cryptodire. Science, 237, 289–291.
35. Gaffney, E. S., Meylan, P. A., & Wyss, A. R. (1991). A computer assisted analysis of the relationships of the higher categories of turtles. Cladistics, 7, 313–335.
36. Gaffney, E. S., Archer, M., & White, A. (1992). Warkalania, a new meiolaniid turtle from the Tertiary Riversleigh deposits of Queensland, Australia. The Beagle, Records of the Northern Territory Museum of Arts and Sciences, 9, 35–48.
37. Gaffney, E. S., Kool, L., Brinkman, D. B., Rich, T. H., & Vickers-Rich, P. (1998). Otwayemys, a new cryptodiran turtle from the Early Cretaceous of Australia. American Museum Novitates, 3233, 1–28.
38. Gaffney, E. S., Tong, H., & Meylan, P. A. (2006). Evolution of the side-necked turtles: The families Bothremydidae, Euraxemydidae and Araripemydidae. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 300, 1–698.
39. Gaffney, E. S., Rich, T. H., Vickers-Rich, P., Constantine, A., Vacca, R., & Kool, L. (2007). Chubutemys, a new eucryptodiran turtle from the Early Cretaceous of Argentina, and the relationships of the Meiolaniidae. American Museum Novitates, 3599, 1–35.
40. Hamilton-Bruce, R. J., & Kear, B. P. (2010). A possible succineid land snail from Lower Cretaceous non-marine deposits of the Griman Creek Formation at Lightning Ridge, New South Wales. Alcheringa, 34, 325–331.
41. Henderson, R. A., Crampton, J. S., Dettman, M. E., Douglas, J. G., Haig, D., Shafik, S., et al. (2000). Biogeographical observations on the Cretaceous biota of Australia. Memoirs of the Association of Australian Palaeontologists, 23, 355–404.
42. Hirayama, R. (1998). Oldest known sea turtle. Nature, 392, 705–708.
43. Hirayama, R., Brinkman, D. B., & Danilov, I. G. (2000). Distribution and biogeography of non-marine Cretaceous turtles. Russian Journal of Herpetology, 7, 181–198.
44. Hocknull, S. A. (2000). Mesozoic freshwater and estuarine bivalves from Australia. Memoirs of the Queensland Museum, 45, 405–426.
45. Hoffstetter, R., & Gasc, J. P. (1969). Vertebrae and ribs of modern reptiles. In C. Gans, A. D. Bellairs, & T. Parsons (Eds.), Biology of the Reptilia Vol 1, Morphology (pp. 201–310). New York: Academic Press.
46. Holmes, G. G., & Senior, B. R. (1976). Lightning ridge opal field. 25th International Geological Congress Sydney Excursion Guide 7B, pp. 13
47. Joyce, W. G. (2007). Phylogenetic relationships of Mesozoic turtles. Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History, 48, 3–102.
48. Joyce, W. G., & Gauthier, J. A. (2004). Palaeoecology of Triassic stem turtles sheds new light on turtle origins. Proceedings of the Royal Society London, 271, 1–5.
49. Joyce, W. G., Parham, J. F., & Gauthier, J. A. (2004). Developing a protocol for the conversion of rank-based taxon names to phylogenetically defined clade names, as exemplified by turtles. Journal of Paleontology, 78, 989–1013.
50. Kear, B. P. (2006a). Reassessment of Cratochelone berneyi Longman, 1915, a giant Early Cretaceous sea turtle from Australia. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 26, 779–783.
51. Kear, B. P. (2006b). Plesiosaur remains from Cretaceous high-latitude non-marine deposits in southeastern Australia. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 26, 196–199.
52. Kear, B. P., & Lee, M. S. (2006). A primitive protostegid from Australia and early sea turtle evolution. Biology Letters, 2, 116–119.
53. Kear, B. P., Schroeder, N. I., Vickers-Rich, P., & Rich, T. H. (2006a). Early Cretaceous high latitude marine reptile assemblages from southern Australia. Paludicola, 5, 200–205.
54. Kear, B. P., Schroeder, N. I., & Lee, M. S. (2006b). An archaic crested plesiosaur in opal from the lower Cretaceous high-latitude deposits of Australia. Biology Letters, 2, 615–619.
55. Kear, B. P., Deacon, G. L., & Siverson, M. (2010). Remains of a Late Cretaceous pterosaur from the Molecap Greensand of Western Australia. Alcheringa, 34, 273–279.
56. Khosatzky, L. I. (1997). Big turtle of the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia. Russian Journal of Herpetology, 4, 148–154.
57. Kolaczkowski, B., & Thornton, J. W. (2006). Is there a star tree paradox? Molecular Biology and Evolution, 23, 1819–1823.
58. Kordikova, E. G. (2002). Comparative morphology of the palate dentition in Proganochelys quenstedti Baur 1887 from the Upper Triassic of Germany and chelonian ancestry. Jahreshber Palaeontologie Abhandlung Stuttgart, 225, 195–249.
59. Lee, M. S. (1996). The homologies and early evolution of the shoulder girdle in turtles. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B, 2663, 111–117.
60. Lewis, P. O. (2001). A likelihood approach to estimating phylogeny from discrete morphological character data. Systematic Biology, 50, 913–925.
61. Megirian, D. (1992). Meiolania brevicollis sp. nov. (Testudines: Meiolaniidae): A new horned turtle from the Australian Miocene. Alcheringa, 16, 93–106.
62. Molnar, R. E. (1991). Fossil reptiles in Australia. In P. Vickers-Rich, J. M. Monaghan, R. F. Baird & T. H. Rich (Eds.), Vertebrate palaeontology of Australasia (pp. 605–702). Melbourne: Monash University Publications Committee.
63. Molnar, R. E. (1999). Avian tibiotarsi from the Early Cretaceous of Lightning Ridge, New South Wales. In Y. Tomida, T. H. Rich, & P. Vickers-Rich (Eds.), Proceedings of the 2nd Gondwanan Dinosaur Symposium. Natural Science Museum Monographs Tokyo, 15, 197–209.
64. Molnar, R. E., & Willis, P. M. (2001). New crocodyliform material from the Early Cretaceous Griman Creek Formation, at Lightning Ridge, New South Wales. In G. C. Grigg, F. Seebacher & C. E. Franklin (Eds.), Crocodilian biology and evolution (pp. 75–82). Chipping Norton: Surrey Beatty and Sons.
65. Mrosovsky, N. (1980). Thermal biology of sea turtles. American Zoology, 20, 531–547.
66. Musser, A. M. (2005). Investigations into the evolution of Australian mammals with a focus on Monotremata. PhD Dissertation, University of New South Wales.
67. Nopcsa, F. (1923). On the geological importance of the primitive reptilian fauna of the upper-most Cretaceous of Hungary; with a description of a new tortoise (Kallokibotion). Quarterly Journal Geological Society, 79, 100–116.
68. Owen, R. (1886). Description of fossil remains of two species of of a megalanian genus (Meiolania) from ‘‘Lord Howe’s Island’’. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 177, 471–480.
69. Parham, J. F., & Hutchinson, J. H. (2003). A new eucryptodiran turtle from the Late Cretaceous of North America (Dinosaur Provincial Park, Alberta, Canada). Journal of Vertebrate Palaeontology, 23, 783–798.
70. Pritchard, P. C. (1984). Piscivory in turtles, and evolution of the long-necked Chelidae. Symposium of the Zoological Society of London, 52, 87–110.
71. Rich, T. H., & Vickers-Rich, P. (2003). Diversity of Early Cretaceous mammals from Victoria, Australia. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History, 285, 36–53.
72. Rich, T. H., Vickers-Rich, P., Flannery, T. F., Kear, B. P., Cantrill, D., Komarower, P., et al. (2009). An Australian multituberculate and its palaeobiogeographical implications. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, 54, 1–6.
73. Ronquist, F., & Huelsenbeck, J. P. (2003). MRBAYES 3: Bayesian phylogenetic inference under mixed models. Bioinformatics, 19, 1572–1574.
74. Rougier, G. W., de la Fuente, M. S., & Arcucci, A. B. (1995). Late Triassic turtles from South America. Science, 268, 855–858.
75. Rowe, T., Rich, T. H., Vickers-Rich, P., Springer, M., & Woodburne, M. O. (2008). The oldest platypus and its bearing on divergence timing of the platypus and echidna clades. PNAS, 1054, 1238–1242.
76. Rueda, E. A., & Gaffney, E. S. (2005). Notoemys zapatocaensis, a new side-necked turtle (Pleurodira: Platychelyidae) from the Early Cretaceous of Colombia. American Museum Novitates, 3470, 1–19.
77. Schumacher, G. H. (1973). The head muscles and hyolaryngeal skeleton of turtles and crocodilians. In C. Gans & T. S. Parsons (Eds.), Biology of the Reptilia (pp. 101–199). New York: Academic Press.
78. Senior, B. R., & Chadderton, L. T. (2007). Natural gamma radiation and exploration for precious opal in Australia. Australian Gem-mologist, 23, 160–176.
79. Smith, E. T. (2009). Terrestrial and freshwater turtles of Early Cretaceous Australia. PhD Dissertation, University of New South Wales.
80. Smith, E. T. (2010). Early Cretaceous chelids from Lightning Ridge, New South Wales. Alcheringa, 34, 375–384.
81. Smith, E. T., & Smith, R. (1999). Black opal fossils of Lightning Ridge. Sydney: Kangaroo Press.
82. Sorenson, M. D., & Franzosa, E. A. (2007). TreeRot, version 3. Boston: Boston University.
83. Sterli, J. (2008). A new, nearly complete stem turtle from the Jurassic of South America with implications for turtle evolution. Biology Letters, 4, 286–289.
84. Sterli, J., & de la Fuente, M. S. (2011). A new turtle from the La Colonia Formation (Campanian-Maastrichtian), Patagonia, Argentina, with remarks on the evolution of the vertebral column in turtles. Palaeontology, 54, 63–68.
85. Sterli, J., & Joyce, W. G. (2007). The cranial anatomy of the Early Jurassic turtle Kayentachelys aprix. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica, 52, 675–694.
86. Sterli, J., de la Fuente, M. S., & Rougier, W. G. (2007). Anatomy and relationships of Palaeochersis talampayensis, a Late Triassic turtle from Argentina. Palaeontographica Abteilung A. Stuttgart, 281, 1–61.
87. Sterli, J., Muller, J., Anquetin, J., & Hilger, A. (2010). The parabasisphenoid complex in Mesozoic turtles and the evolution of the testudinate basicranium. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences, 47, 1337–1346.
88. Stevens, G. R., & Clayton, R. N. (1971). Oxygen isotope studies on Jurassic and Cretaceous belemnites from New Zealand and their biogeographic significance. New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics, 14, 829–897.
89. Sukhanov, V. B. (2000). Mesozoic turtles of Middle and Central Asia. In M. J. Benton, M. A. Shishkin, D. M. Unwin & E. N. Kurochkin (Eds.), The age of dinosaurs in Russia and Mongolia (pp. 309– 367). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
90. Sukhanov, V. B., & Narmandankh, P. (1974). New Early Cretaceous turtle from continental deposits of the northern Gobi. Mesozoic and Cenozoic Biostratigraphy of Mongolia. The Joint Soviet-Mongolian Palaeontological Expedition, Transactions, 1, 192–200 (in Russian).
91. Sukhanov, V. B., & Narmandankh, P. (2006). New taxa of Mesozoic turtles from Mongolia. Fossil Turtle Research, 1, 119–127.
92. Swofford, D. L. (2002). PAUP*. Phylogenetic analysis using parsimony (*and other methods). Version 4. Sunderland: Sinauer Associates.
93. Tarduno, J. A., Brinkman, D. B., Renne, P. R., Cottrell, R. D., Scher, H., & Castillo, P. (1998). Evidence for extreme climatic warmth from Late Cretaceous Arctic vertebrates. Science, 282, 2241–2244.
94. Thomson, J. S. (1932). The anatomy of the tortoise. Scientific Proceedings of the Royal Society of Dublin, 20, 359–461.
95. Thulborn, A., & Turner, S. (2003). The last dicynodont. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B, 270, 985–993.
96. Wagner, A. (1853). Beschreibung einer fossilen Schildkröte und etlicher anderer Reptilien- Überreste aus den lithographischen Schiefern und dem grünen Sandsteine von Kehlheim. Abhandlungen der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Mathematisch-physikalische Klasse, 7(1).
97. Walker, W. F. (1973). The locomotor apparatus of Testudines. In C. Gans & T. S. Parsons (Eds.), Biology of the Reptilia Vol 4, Morphology (pp. 1–100). New York: Academic Press.
98. Warren, J. W. (1969). A fossil chelonian of probable Lower Cretaceous age from Victoria, Australia. Memoirs of the National Museum of Victoria, 29, 23–29.
99. Watkins, J. (1984). Future prospects for opal mining in the Lightning Ridge region. New South Wales Geological Survey Report, 119, 1–50.
100. White, A. W., Worthy, T. H., Hawkins, S., Bedford, S., & Spriggs, M. (2010). Megafaunal meiolaniid horned turtles survived until early human settlement in Vanuatu, Southwest Pacific. PNAS, 107, 15512–15516.
101. Wiman, C. (1930). Fossile Schildkröten aus China. Paleontologica Sinica, Series C, 6, 1–56.
102. Woodward, A. S. (1901). On some extinct reptiles from Patagonia, of the genera Miolania, Dinilysia and Genyodectes. Proceedings of the Zoological Society London, 1901, 169–184.
103. Worthy, T. H., & Lee, M. S. Y. (2008). Affinities of Miocene waterfowl (Anatidae: Manuherikia, Dunstanetta and Mioadorna) from the St Bathans fauna, New Zealand. Palaeontology, 51, 667–708.
104. Yeh, H.-K. (1986). A Jurassic turtle discovered for the first time in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. Vertebrata PalAsiatica, 24, 171–181.