A review of the Tertiary fossil Cetacea (Mammalia) localities in Australia

Abstract

Fitzgerald, E.M. G. 2004. A review of the Tertiary fossil Cetacea (Mammalia) localities in Australia. Memoirs of Museum Victoria 61(2): 183-208.The stratigraphy, age, lithology, and vertebrate fauna of all 56 pre-Pleistocene fossil Cetacea-bearing localities in Australia are reviewed. The majority of these localities occur in the state of Victoria, and are Miocene in age. The most complete cetacean fossils have been recovered from coastal exposures of the Upper Oligocene Jan Juc Formation, southwest of Torquay in the Torquay Basin (Victoria). The inadequately known fossil record of cetaceans in Australia is due to a lack of research, and not a lack of potentially fossiliferous rock outcrop.

A Late Eocene age proposal for the Loreto Formation (Brunswick Peninsula, southernmost Chile), based on fossil cartilaginous fishes, paleobotany and radiometric evidence

“…A similar situation is seen between Carcharodon carcharias Linnaeus, 1758 and Cosmopolitodus hastalis (Agassiz, 1843), the latter possibly being the ancestor of the former (Nyberg et al, 2006). Furthermore, it is consistent with the presence of the derived species C. totuserratus exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere during the Oligocene-Miocene, with two records in the Pacific (Fitzgerald, 2004;Suárez et al, 2006) and one in the Atlantic Ocean (Cione and Expósito, 1980).…”

“…Comments and age: The genus Carcharoides includes only two known species: C. totuserratus Ameghino, 1901 and C. catticus (Philippi, 1846). The first species was reported exclusively from the Southern Hemisphere, particularly in the Late Oligocene of Australia (Chapman, 1913;Fitzgerald, 2004), the Early Miocene of Argentina (Cione, 1978;Cione and Expósito, 1980) and the Early Miocene of Chile (Suárez et al, 2006). The second species, C. catticus, can be diagnosed by anterior odontaspidid-like teeth and lamnoid lateral teeth, the latter with a triangular cusp and one triangular cusplet on each side, bent lingually (Cappetta, 1987), and having a smooth cutting edge that frequently does not reach the base.…”

Pliocene marine mammals from the Whalers Bluff Formation of Portland, Victoria, Australia

“…Specimens referred to in this study. For more detailed locality/stratigraphic data see Fitzgerald (2004b . Further study of terrestrial mammals from the Whalers Bluff Formation may help refine the geological age of this unit.…”

“…Stratigraphic correlation of the Portland fossil marine mammal-bearing formations with selected major late Neogene marine mammalbearing units. Stratigraphy and geochronology are from Barnes (1973Barnes ( , 1977Barnes ( , 1984Barnes ( , 1998, Muizon and DeVries (1985), Muizon and Bellon (1986), Gottfried et al (1994), , Prothero (1998), Fordyce (2002a), Fordyce et al (2002), Fitzgerald (2004b), Muizon et al (2004), Barnes et al (2005) and Gradstein et al (2004) Fordyce, 2002b), although the record only becomes reasonably well known from the Mio-Pliocene boundary onwards (McLeod et al, 1993;Bisconti, 2003 Lacépède, 1818(e.g., Cummings, 1985Reeves and Leatherwood, 1985;Bannister, 2002). Note that Rice (1998) included all extant balaenids in the genus Balaena and recognised only two species, B. mysticetus and B. glacialis.…”

Fossil craniid brachiopods (Craniata) of Australia and New Zealand

“…Four localities are shallowshelf, bioclastic bryozoal calcarenites-the Waurn Ponds Limestone, Calder River Limestone, upper Maude Limestone and Batesford Limestone. The fifth locality is the Muddy Creek Marl, a 'richly fossiliferous grey silty marl' (Fitzgerald 2004). Specimens have also been collected at a single locality in Tasmania, the shallow-water, molluscrich Freestone Cove Sandstone (Quilty 1972).…”