Paurodontidae

Paurodontidae is a family of Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous mammals in the order Dryolestida. Remains of paurodontids have been found in the United States, Britain, Portugal, and Tanzania. The group likely represents a paraphyletic group of basal non dryolestid dryolestidans. Paurodon has been suggested to have been a specilast feeder on earthworms due to the morphology of its teeth closely resembling that of the golden mole genus Amblysomus.

Paurodontidae

Othniel Charles Marsh · Public Domain · 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
DryolestoideaPBDB
Diet
insectivorePBDB, for Mammaliaformes
Life habit
scansorialPBDB, for Mammaliaformes
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Mammalia

Time the record covers

At least 20 million years on record.

The record covers at least 161.5 Mya to 141 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 165.3 Mya to 139.1 Mya.

Middle Jurassic — about 1 of 14 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 11 of 14 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 2 of 14 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous166–165 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences165–164 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences164–163 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences163–162 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences162–161 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences155–154 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences154–153 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences153–152 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences152–151 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences151–150 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences150–149 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences149–149 Mya — about 1 occurrence149–148 Mya — about 1 occurrence148–147 Mya — about 1 occurrence147–146 Mya — about 1 occurrence146–145 Mya — about 1 occurrence145–144 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences144–143 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences143–142 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences142–141 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences141–140 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences140–139 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences139–139 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences161.5 Mya141 Mya165.8 Mya138.6 Mya

14 occurrences of Paurodontidae on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. 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

14 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

4 formations

Morrison — 41.88°N, 105.89°WMorrison — 41.89°N, 106.00°WMorrison — 40.47°N, 109.18°WMorrison — 39.15°N, 108.77°WMorrison — 38.99°N, 109.27°WAlcobaça — 39.70°N, 8.80°WLulworth — 50.60°N, 1.97°WLulworth — 50.61°N, 1.95°WBalabansai — 41.34°N, 72.23°E

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The named rock units Paurodontidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Paurodontidae and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Paurodontidae and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

275 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 10 sites for Paurodontidae, 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

12 references

Each of the 14 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 Paurodontidae

Credit
Othniel Charles Marsh
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Paurodontidae 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 itDryolestoidea through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Marsh 1887