Balaenotus

Balaenotus is an extinct genus of cetaceans from the Pliocene of Belgium.

Balaenotus

Ghedoghedo · 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
BalaenidaePBDB
Diet
suspension feederPBDB, for Balaenidae
Life habit
aquaticPBDB, for Mysticeti
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Cetacea
Environment
marinePBDB, for Mysticeti

Time the record covers

At least 1 million years on record.

The record covers at least 3.6 Mya to 2.58 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 7.246 Mya to 774 ka.

Miocene — about 0 of 16 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 14 of 16 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 1 of 16 occurrencesPleistocene7.2–7.0 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences7.0–6.8 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.8–6.5 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.5–6.3 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.3–6.0 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.0–5.8 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.8–5.5 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.5–5.3 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences5.3–5.0 Mya — about 1 occurrence5.0–4.8 Mya — about 1 occurrence4.8–4.5 Mya — about 1 occurrence4.5–4.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence4.3–4.0 Mya — about 1 occurrence4.0–3.8 Mya — about 1 occurrence3.8–3.5 Mya — about 1 occurrence3.5–3.3 Mya — about 2 occurrences3.3–3.0 Mya — about 2 occurrences3.0–2.8 Mya — about 2 occurrences2.8–2.5 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.5–2.3 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences2.3–2.0 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences2.0–1.8 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences1.8–1.5 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.5–1.3 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.3–1.0 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences1.0–772 ka Mya — about 0.0 occurrences3.6 Mya2.58 Mya7.7 Mya274 ka

16 occurrences of Balaenotus on record, most of them in the Pliocene. 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

16 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

3 formations

Red Crag — 51.96°N, 1.35°EYorktown — 37.20°N, 76.90°WMonte Vaticano — 41.90°N, 12.45°E

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The named rock units Balaenotus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 13 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Balaenotus and its relatives

Pliocene

Where Balaenotus and its relatives were recorded in the Pliocene.

Found in the same rock

266 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 11 sites for Balaenotus, 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

8 references

Each of the 16 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. 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 Balaenotus

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
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 itBalaenidae through timeFormations of the PlioceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Van Beneden 1872)