Alphadontidae

Alphadontidae was a family of mammals belonging to the clade Metatheria, the group of mammals that includes modern-day marsupials.

Alphadontidae

Uncredited · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
MarsupialiformesPBDB
Diet
omnivorePBDB, for Metatheria
Life habit
scansorialPBDB, for Theria
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Mammalia

Time the record covers

At least 37 million years on record.

The record covers at least 93.9 Mya to 56 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 100.5 Mya to 48.07 Mya.

Early Cretaceous — about 0 of 223 occurrencesLate Cretaceous — about 221 of 223 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 1 of 223 occurrencesPaleoceneEocene — about 1 of 223 occurrencesEocene102–100 Mya — about 1 occurrence100–98 Mya — about 3 occurrences98–96 Mya — about 3 occurrences96–94 Mya — about 3 occurrences94–92 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences91–89 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences89–87 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences87–85 Mya — about 4 occurrences85–83 Mya — about 14 occurrences83–82 Mya — about 18 occurrences82–80 Mya — about 18 occurrences80–78 Mya — about 18 occurrences78–76 Mya — about 18 occurrences76–74 Mya — about 18 occurrences74–72 Mya — about 18 occurrences72–71 Mya — about 23 occurrences71–69 Mya — about 23 occurrences69–67 Mya — about 23 occurrences67–65 Mya — about 13 occurrences65–63 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences56–54 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences54–52 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences52–51 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences51–49 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences49–47 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences93.9 Mya56 Mya102 Mya47 Mya

223 occurrences of Alphadontidae on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

223 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

29 formations

Hell Creek — 47.80°N, 106.10°WHell Creek — 47.57°N, 107.10°WHell Creek — 47.55°N, 107.10°WHell Creek — 47.52°N, 106.40°WHell Creek — 47.87°N, 106.18°WHell Creek — 47.07°N, 106.92°WHell Creek — 47.63°N, 106.20°WHell Creek — 47.10°N, 104.80°WHell Creek — 45.50°N, 103.10°WHell Creek — 47.68°N, 106.43°WHell Creek — 46.90°N, 101.50°WHell Creek — 45.95°N, 103.96°WHell Creek — 45.76°N, 104.92°WHell Creek — 45.66°N, 105.08°WHell Creek — 46.45°N, 104.02°WJudith River — 47.81°N, 109.59°WJudith River — 48.98°N, 110.52°WJudith River — 48.93°N, 110.58°WJudith River — 48.57°N, 109.70°WJudith River — 48.93°N, 110.65°WJudith River — 46.10°N, 109.10°WJudith River — 48.01°N, 108.91°WMesaverde — 43.20°N, 107.10°WMesaverde — 44.10°N, 107.76°WMesaverde — 42.85°N, 107.28°WMesaverde — 44.08°N, 107.73°WWahweap — 37.59°N, 112.90°WWahweap — 37.56°N, 112.28°WWahweap — 37.63°N, 112.12°WWahweap — 37.60°N, 111.35°WOldman — 50.78°N, 110.50°WOldman — 50.50°N, 110.30°WOldman — 50.90°N, 111.80°WOldman — 49.08°N, 110.68°WOldman — 49.08°N, 110.84°WOldman — 49.10°N, 110.94°WOldman — 50.81°N, 111.63°WLance — 41.57°N, 108.67°WLance — 43.15°N, 104.57°WLance — 44.94°N, 108.85°WLance — 43.17°N, 104.53°WLance — 43.13°N, 104.49°WLance — 43.12°N, 104.64°WLance — 43.80°N, 104.62°WLance — 45.04°N, 108.80°WKaiparowits — 37.40°N, 111.20°WKaiparowits — 37.80°N, 111.50°WKaiparowits — 37.42°N, 111.77°WNaturita — 37.40°N, 111.20°WNaturita — 37.80°N, 111.50°WNaturita — 37.65°N, 112.97°WAguja — 29.20°N, 103.20°WAguja — 29.32°N, 103.52°WAguja — 29.10°N, 103.17°WAguja — 29.30°N, 103.57°WMilk River — 49.10°N, 111.80°WScollard — 51.91°N, 112.97°WScollard — 51.80°N, 113.00°WEagle — 48.97°N, 111.82°WOjo Alamo — 36.30°N, 108.20°WOjo Alamo — 36.24°N, 108.89°WFruitland — 36.30°N, 108.20°WFruitland — 36.49°N, 108.54°WKirtland — 36.30°N, 108.20°WKirtland — 36.17°N, 107.80°WFrenchman — 49.30°N, 108.40°WFrenchman — 49.52°N, 108.82°WSt. Mary River — 48.90°N, 112.80°WSt. Mary River — 48.43°N, 112.83°WNorth Horn — 39.00°N, 111.00°WForemost — 49.13°N, 110.87°WStraight Cliffs — 37.70°N, 113.00°WTwo Medicine — 47.82°N, 112.66°WDinosaur Park — 49.96°N, 110.27°WJudith River — 49.10°N, 109.50°WSt. Mary River — 49.91°N, 112.99°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Alphadontidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 5 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 10 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Alphadontidae and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Alphadontidae and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

703 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 140 sites for Alphadontidae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

70 references

Each of the 223 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 58 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Alphadontidae

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Alphadontidae was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itMarsupialiformes through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Marshall et al. 1990)