The Late Triassic microvertebrate fauna of Tytherington, UK

A distinctive Late Triassic microvertebrate fissure fauna and a new species of Clevosaurus (Lepidosauria: Rhynchocephalia) from Woodleaze Quarry, Gloucestershire, UK

“…Although smaller, the specimen is strikingly similar to a dentary from Tytherington (Van den Berg et al, 2012;Fig. 4J and K).…”

“…The Tytherington fissures include conglomerates, breccias, and recrystallised limestones, as well as calcareous red, green and black mudstones and sandstones. Tetrapod bones are found mainly in conglomerates in the Tytherington fissures, such as those described by Van den Berg et al (2012). The Woodleaze deposits are more consistent, comprising bedded green, yellow and (some) red calcareous mudstones or siltstones.…”

“…The absence of archosauriforms in the Woodleaze collection suggests that those predators may have been rare in the habitat above the fissure. This is probably not a result of sorting during transport, as archosaur fossils, mainly teeth, are similar in size and found in good numbers with sphenodontians in other fissure microvertebrate assemblages, and they are the second most numerous taxa in fissure 2 at Tytherington ( Van den Berg et al, 2012) and at Durdham Down (Foffa et al, 2014).…”

“…1A) of limestone and sandstone palaeo-islands (Robinson, 1957;Whiteside and Marshall, 2008). The principal tetrapodyielding localities are Tytherington quarry (Whiteside, 1983;Whiteside and Marshall, 2008;Van den Berg et al, 2012), Cromhall (Fraser, 1994) and Durdham Down (Foffa et al, 2014). The chronological succession of the fissures is not certain, but the most common view is that the earliest tetrapod biota consisted of reptiles only, and therefore these fissures were termed 'sauropsid', whereas the younger deposits include mammaliamorphs such as Morganucodon and Oligokyphus (Robinson, 1957).…”

The terrestrial fauna of the Late Triassic Pant-y-ffynnon Quarry fissures, South Wales, UK and a new species of Clevosaurus (Lepidosauria: Rhynchocephalia)

“…This was clear from the different, more abraded, mode of preservation of the crinoids and the Triassic fossils. These ossicles range in diameter from 1-10 mm and are typical of similar fissure deposits, such as at Tytherington Quarry (Van den Berg et al, 2012) where the fissures are also embedded in the Carboniferous Black Rock Subgroup.…”