Lissasfa (Miocene to of Morocco)

Where: Morocco (33.6° N, 7.6° W: paleocoordinates 33.5° N, 7.9° W)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

When: Late/Upper Miocene to Late/Upper Miocene (11.6 - 3.6 Ma)

• Rodents present suggest an age of 5.5-6Ma, near the Miocene/Pliocene boundary (Geraads 2011)

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: coastal; mixed carbonate-siliciclastic sediments

• 'Member 1: a pink facies of altered calcarenite, containing internal molds of gastropods and rare fragments of thick bone; this is truncated by a yellow aeolianite containing large mammal bones and which is characteristic of supratidal surroundings; a few hundred metres to the south, towards Mediouna, intertidal facies rest on a substratum of Cambrian quartzites; this succession characterizes a regressive situation responsible for the erection of the Marchich barrier complex.

•Member 2: this is associated with a paleo-shoreline in a micro-cliff cut within Member 1; its facies characterizes an infratidal to supratidal environment; a basal conglomerate is visible resting on a substratum of quartzites at about 155m above present sea level; one observes a vertical and lateral transition to a capping aeolianite that conceals the relict shoreline and overlaps deposits of member 1; large bones of vertebrates are scattered in the eolianite. Towards the top of member 2, washout pockets contain a bioclastic sediment formed from the remains of biocalcarenite, rich in bony fragments of micro-mammals and larger vertebrates.'

Size class: mesofossils

Collection methods: bulk,

• Material held in the collections of INSAP, Rabat.

Primary reference: J.P. Raynal, D. Lefevre, D. Geraads and M. El Graoui. 1999. Contribution du site paleontologique de Lissasfa (Casablanca, maroc) a une nouvelle interpretation du Mio-Pliocene de la Meseta. Comptes Rendues de l'Academie des Sciences, Paris, Sciences de la terre et des planetes 329:617-622 [A. Turner/H. O'Regan/H. O'Regan]more details

Purpose of describing collection: biostratigraphic analysis

PaleoDB collection 34366: authorized by Alan Turner, entered by Hannah O'Regan on 28.08.2003, edited by Evangelos Vlachos and Bethany Allen

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

• Rich in microfauna - over 2000 rodent teeth. Bats and insectivores present, but not described in these papers. Few identifiable large mammal remains.
Reptilia
 Testudines - Testudinidae
Centrochelys sp.3 Gray 1872 spurred tortoise
INSAP LSF-5, partial shell with complete plastron
Mammalia
 Insectivora -
Insectivora indet. Bowdich 1821 insectivoran
present but not described
 Placentalia -
Chiroptera indet. Blumenbach 1779 bat
present but not described
 Carnivora - Canidae
Canidae indet. Fischer de Waldheim 1817 canid
? Nyctereutes sp.2 Temminck 1839 raccoon dog
 Perissodactyla - Rhinocerotidae
Rhinocerotidae indet. Gray 1821 rhinoceros
 Artiodactyla - Giraffidae
cf. Sivatherium sp. Falconer and Cautley 1836 giraffe
 Rodentia - Sciuridae
Atlantoxerus sp.1 Major 1893 squirrel
 Rodentia - Muridae
"Gerbillidae indet." = Gerbillinae1, Praomys sp.1
"Gerbillidae indet." = Gerbillinae1 Gray 1825 gerbil
Praomys sp.1 Thomas 1915 African soft-furred rat
 Rodentia - Cricetidae
Myocricetodon sp.1 Lavocat 1952 mouse
 Rodentia - Ctenodactylidae
Irhoudia sp.1 Jaeger 1971 gundi