Cerro La Cruz (Miocene of Venezuela)

Where: Lara, Venezuela (10.4° N, 70.1° W: paleocoordinates 9.6° N, 66.7° W)

• coordinate stated in text

• small collection-level geographic resolution

When: Castillo Formation, Burdigalian (20.4 - 16.0 Ma)

• Unit B (Rincon et al. 2014)

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: lagoonal; gray mudstone

• The lithology of the Cerro La Cruz sequence consists of alternating packages of siliciclastic and carbonate sediments, deposited principally in a near-shore marine environment (subtidal shallow marine, intertidal near mangroves), with episodes of continental environments of appar- ently short duration (see Rincon et al., 2014, for details).
• gray mudstone

Size class: macrofossils

Collection methods: IVIC-P,ColecciondePaleon- tologıa, Laboratorio de Paleontologıa, Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientıficas, Caracas, Venezuela; MBLUZ-P, Museo de Biologıa de la Universidad del Zulia, Seccion de Pale- ontologıa, Maracaibo, Venezuela.

Primary reference: A. Solorzano and A. D. Rincon. 2015. The earliest record (early Miocene) of a bony-toothed bird from South America and a reexamination of Venezuelan pelagornithids. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 35(6):e995188 [M. Uhen/M. Uhen]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 175185: authorized by Mark Uhen, entered by Mark Uhen on 04.12.2015, edited by Ascanio Rincon

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Show authors, comments, and common names
Aves
 Odontopterygiformes - Pelagornithidae
cf. Pelagornis sp.
cf. Pelagornis sp. Lartet 1857 bird
Reptilia
 Testudines - Chelidae
Chelus colombianus1
Chelus colombianus1 Wood 1976 Chelus colombiana
Mammalia
  - Mylodontidae
Baraguatherium takumara n. gen. n. sp.2
Baraguatherium takumara n. gen. n. sp.2 Rincón et al. 2016 edentate
1Ferreira et al. 2016; 2Rincón et al. 2016