Rhynchaeites

Rhynchaeites is an extinct genus of wading bird, a stem-group threshkiornithid, which lived in Europe and North America during the Eocene epoch. The genus contains three species, R. messelensis, R. litoralis and R. mcfaddeni. It is one of the oldest members of the ibis family known from fossil remains.

Rhynchaeites

Haplochromis · 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
RhynchaeitinaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Threskiornithidae
Life habit
volantPBDB, for Threskiornithidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Threskiornithidae

Time the record covers

At most 15 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 56 Mya and 41.03 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Paleocene — about 0 of 3 occurrencesEocene — about 3 of 3 occurrencesEocene57–56 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences56–55 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences55–55 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences55–54 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences54–54 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences54–53 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences53–53 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences53–52 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences52–52 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences52–51 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences51–51 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences51–50 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences50–50 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences50–49 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences49–49 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences49–48 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences48–47 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences47–47 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences47–46 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences46–46 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences46–45 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences45–45 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences45–44 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences44–44 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences44–43 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences43–43 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences43–42 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences42–42 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences42–41 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences41–41 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences56.5 Mya40.5 Mya

3 occurrences of Rhynchaeites on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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

3 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

2 formations

London Clay — 51.85°N, 1.28°EMessel — 49.93°N, 8.73°E

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

Rhynchaeites and its relatives

Eocene

Where Rhynchaeites and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

48 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 2 sites for Rhynchaeites, 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

2 references

Each of the 3 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 Rhynchaeites

Credit
Haplochromis
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Rhynchaeites 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 itRhynchaeitinae through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Wittich 1898