The site of Shuitangba (Yunnan, China) preserves a unique, terminal Miocene fauna

Pollen evidence of the palaeoenvironments of Lufengpithecus lufengensis in the Zhaotong Basin, southeastern margin of the Tibetan Plateau

“…2). It should be noted that three lignite layers occur in the late Neogene sedimentary sequence of the Zhaotong Basin (Dai and Chou, 2007;Wang, 2010); however, the upper lignite layer is absent at the STB station (Jablonski et al, 2014). A new, relatively complete juvenile cranium of the fossil hominoid Lufengpithecus was excavated from the middle-upper part of the black peaty clay layer , which is bracketed by the middle and lower lignite layers (see Unit #6 in Table 1 and Fig.…”

“…Detailed magnetostratigraphic and biostratigraphic investigations of the STB section place stringent age controls on the hominoid-bearing strata Jablonski et al, 2014). The recovered mammalian fauna from the section belongs to the East Asian Baodean Stage/Age Jablonski et al, 2014), which is a standard terrestrial biochron for the late Miocene, from~7.25 to~5.33 Ma (Qiu et al, 2013).…”

A new otter of giant size,Siamogale melilutrasp. nov. (Lutrinae: Mustelidae: Carnivora), from the latest Miocene Shuitangba site in north-eastern Yunnan, south-western China, and a total-evidence phylogeny of lutrines

“…Palaeomagnetic studies reveal a normal polarity for the 14 m long Shuitangba fossil section, which, along with a longer drill core (120 m) several hundred metres away, was correlated to the top of subchron C3An.1n through the base of C3An.2n (Ji et al 2013), with an age estimate of 6.03-6.73 Ma (Hilgen et al 2012). However, the beds that produced the otter remains are essentially the same as those from which the hominoid fossils were recovered, which is close to »6.2 Ma (Ji et al 2013;Jablonski et al 2014).…”

“…The fauna from Shuitangba appears to be of the late Baodean Chinese Land Mammal Age (late Miocene) with typical large mammals such as the deer Muntiacus (Dong et al 2014), the tapir Tapirus , the proboscideans Stegodon and Sinomastodon , and small mammals such as the rodents Sinocastor, Kowalskia and Pliopetaurista (Ji et al 2013;Jablonski et al 2014). Palaeomagnetic studies reveal a normal polarity for the 14 m long Shuitangba fossil section, which, along with a longer drill core (120 m) several hundred metres away, was correlated to the top of subchron C3An.1n through the base of C3An.2n (Ji et al 2013), with an age estimate of 6.03-6.73 Ma (Hilgen et al 2012).…”

“…Well-preserved otter material of giant size, including crania, mandibles and postcranials, was recently unearthed from the latest Miocene lignite beds of Shuitangba in Yunnan Province (Ji et al 2013;Jablonski et al 2014) and represents a new species of fossil otter (Fig. 1).…”