Arganodus

Arganodus is an extinct genus of freshwater lungfish that had a wide global distribution throughout much of the Triassic period, with a single species surviving across Gondwana into the Cretaceous. It is the only member of the family Arganodontidae, although it is sometimes placed in the Ceratodontidae or synonymized with the genus Asiatoceratodus.

Arganodus

Petrified Forest from Petrified Forest, USA · Public Domain · via Wikidata/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
CeratodontidaePBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
lagoonal,marine,brackish,freshwaterPBDB, for Dipnoi

Time the record covers

At least 140 million years on record.

The record covers at least 247 Mya to 106.3 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 250.8 Mya to 93.9 Mya.

Permian — about 0 of 62 occurrencesEarly Triassic — about 3 of 62 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 0 of 62 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 54 of 62 occurrencesLate TriassicEarly Jurassic — about 0 of 62 occurrencesMiddle Jurassic — about 1 of 62 occurrencesLate Jurassic — about 2 of 62 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 1 of 62 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 1 of 62 occurrences254–248 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences248–243 Mya — about 2 occurrences238–232 Mya — about 3 occurrences232–227 Mya — about 4 occurrences227–221 Mya — about 12 occurrences221–216 Mya — about 12 occurrences216–210 Mya — about 12 occurrences210–205 Mya — about 11 occurrences205–200 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences172–167 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences167–161 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences161–156 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences156–151 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences151–145 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences145–140 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences123–118 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences118–113 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences107–102 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences102–96 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences96–91 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences247 Mya106.3 Mya254 Mya91 Mya

62 occurrences of Arganodus on record, most of them in the Late Triassic. 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

62 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

14 formations

Chinle — 35.05°N, 109.83°WChinle — 37.80°N, 110.33°WChinle — 35.09°N, 109.80°WChinle — 34.94°N, 109.77°WChinle — 34.51°N, 109.36°WChinle — 34.83°N, 109.81°WChinle — 35.38°N, 109.40°WChinle — 34.92°N, 109.91°WChinle — 34.94°N, 109.74°WChinle — 34.73°N, 109.67°WChinle — 35.56°N, 106.82°WChinle — 34.90°N, 107.73°WChinle — 34.50°N, 109.32°WTecovas — 33.43°N, 101.16°WTecovas — 33.42°N, 101.13°WTecovas — 35.38°N, 102.16°WRedonda — 34.94°N, 103.43°WRedonda — 34.95°N, 103.44°WGarita Creek — 35.33°N, 104.35°WGarita Creek — 35.28°N, 104.55°WTimezgadiouine — 31.03°N, 9.04°WPetropavlovskaya — 52.52°N, 55.70°EPetropavlovskaya — 52.03°N, 55.72°EGara Samani — 29.67°N, 1.92°EColorado City — 32.17°N, 101.25°WSanta Rosa — 35.24°N, 105.79°WPetropavlovka — 50.81°N, 55.24°ECumnock — 35.62°N, 79.10°WTacuarembó — 31.87°S, 55.90°WAnoual — 32.52°N, 3.11°WElrhaz — 16.47°N, 9.17°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Arganodus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 3 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Arganodus and its relatives

Late Triassic

Where Arganodus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Triassic.

Found in the same rock

237 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 59 sites for Arganodus, 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

22 references

Each of the 62 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. 10 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 Arganodus

Credit
Petrified Forest from Petrified Forest, USA
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

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 itCeratodontidae through timeFormations of the Late TriassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Martin 1979