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

• coordinate stated in text

• outcrop-level geographic resolution

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

• The Castillo Formation has formely been regarded as late Oligocene in age (Wheeler, 1960), but more recent workers, including this reference regard it to be early Miocene. The Castillo Formation unconformably overlies Eocene rocks of the Misoa Formation, although neither upper or lower contacts can be viewed at the collection's section. The section comprises 87 m of clayey marls interbedded with numerous thin (<1 m) hardground units. The strata are underlain and overlain by sandstones, and the upper 15 m are gypsiferous. Most fossils were collected near the base of the exposures. The turtle skull was collected from the top, however.

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: shallow subtidal; argillaceous marl

Size class: macrofossils

Reposited in the AMNH, USNM

Collection methods: quarrying,

• Collections deposited in the AMNH, MBLUZ (Museo de Biologia de la Universidad del Zulia, Maracaibo), and USNM.

Primary reference: M. R. Sanchez-Villagra, R. J. Burnham, D.C. Campbell, R.M. Feldmann, E.S. Gaffney, R.S. Kay, R. Lozsan, R. Purdy, and J.G.M. Thewissen. 2000. A new near-shore marine fauna and flora from the early Neogene of northwestern Venezuela. Journal of Paleontology 74(5):957-968 [A. Miller/A. Hendy/A. Hendy]more details

Purpose of describing collection: taxonomic analysis

PaleoDB collection 43063: authorized by Austin Hendy, entered by Austin Hendy on 09.08.2004, edited by Mark Uhen, Juan Carrillo and Philip Mannion

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)