Breagyps clarki

Breagyps is an extinct genus of New World vulture in the family Cathartidae. The genus takes its name from the La Brea Tar Pits in California, where its remains have been recovered. Breagyps clarki is one of three vulture species represented by fossil material from the tar pits, including the extant Turkey vulture.

Breagyps clarki

Jonathan Chen · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 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
BreagypsPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Cathartidae
Life habit
volantPBDB, for Cathartidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Cathartidae

Time the record covers

At most 199 thousand years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 210 ka and 11.7 ka, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Pleistocene — about 5 of 5 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 0 of 5 occurrences213 ka–189 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences189 ka–166 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences166 ka–142 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences142 ka–118 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences118 ka–95 ka Mya — about 0.8 occurrences95 ka–71 ka Mya — about 0.8 occurrences71 ka–47 ka Mya — about 0.8 occurrences47 ka–24 ka Mya — about 0.8 occurrences24 ka–0 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences710 ka0 Mya

5 occurrences of Breagyps clarki on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. 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

5 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

1 formation

Becerra — 19.90°N, 99.13°W

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The named rock units Breagyps clarki has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Breagyps clarki and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Breagyps clarki and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

202 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 5 sites for Breagyps clarki, 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

4 references

Each of the 5 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 content2

Picture of Breagyps clarki

Credit
Jonathan Chen
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

Structured light scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Breagyps clarki · LACM:rlb:B 1910

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itBreagyps through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Miller 1910)