Gerbillus
Gerbillus is a genus that contains most common and the most diverse gerbils. In 2010, after morphological and molecular studies Dipodillus was ranged as a subgenus of Gerbillus, however some taxonomic authorities continue to separate them.

XV8-Crisis · 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
- GerbillinaePBDB
- Diet
- granivorePBDB
- Life habit
- ground dwellingPBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Time the record covers
At least 5 million years on record.
The record covers at least 5.09 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 8.725 Mya to 0 Mya.
34 occurrences of Gerbillus on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. 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
34 occurrences- Miocene3%
- Pliocene9%
- Pleistocene85%
- Holocene3%
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
2 formations
- Shungura Formation · Omo Group1
- C1/LR Formation1
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The named rock units Gerbillus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 32 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Gerbillus and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Gerbillus and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
325 taxa- Meriones14 sites
- Paraethomys10 sites
- Praomys9 sites
- Ellobius8 sites
- Arvicanthis6 sites
- Crocidura6 sites
- Mus6 sites
- Chiroptera5 sites
- Equus4 sites
- Gazella atlantica4 sites
- Hystrix cristata4 sites
- Lepus4 sites
- Lepus capensis4 sites
- Mascaromys medius4 sites
- Panthera leo4 sites
- Squamata4 sites
- Testudo graeca4 sites
- Apodemus3 sites
- Connochaetes taurinus3 sites
- Eliomys3 sites
- Epimys (Aethomys)3 sites
- Eryx3 sites
- Gekkonidae3 sites
- Hyaena hyaena3 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 23 sites for Gerbillus, 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
13 references- Decouverte en Afrique du Nord de restes humains du Paleolithique inferieur14
- Plio-Pleistocene mammalian biostratigraphy of Atlantic Morocco7
- The microvertebrates of Qesem Cave: A comparison of the two concentrations2
- The Mousterian site of Jebel Irhoud, Morocco: new data on the fauna and biochronology, and description of a new human fossil2
- The late Pliocene locality of Ahl al Oughlam, Morocco; vertebrate fauna and interpretation1
- Earliest Pleistocene hominid cranial remains from Dmanisi, Republic of Georgia: taxonomy, geological setting, and age1
- The faunal remains from Evron Quarry in relation to other Lower Paleolithic hominid sites in the Levant1
- Un nouveau gisement paleontologique plio-pleistocene en Afrique du Nord: Ahl al Oughlam (ancienne carriere Deprez) a Casablanca (Maroc)1
- The Omo Group: Archives of the International Omo Research Expedition1
- Paleoenvironmental and Cultural Implications of Late Holocene Archaeological Faunas from the Orange Free State and North Central Cape Province, South Africa1
- Vallesian and Turolian rodents from Biotia, Attica and Rhodes (Greece) I + II1
- Report on Test Excavations in a Prehistoric Pigment Mine near Postmasburg, North Cape1
Each of the 34 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. 1 further reference is 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 content2
Picture of Gerbillus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- XV8-Crisis
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Licence
- In Copyright
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Gerbillus gerbillus gerbillus · UMMZ:mammals:156635
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Gerbillus”
- 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 itGerbillinae through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Desmarest 1804