The Deseado Formation of PatagoniaLoomis, Frederic Brewster
Science
The Deseado Formation of Patagonia
Loomis, Frederic Brewster
Paleontology -- Patagonia (Argentina and Chile)
Either this bridge remained until into the early Tertiary; so the
_Pyrotheria_ and _Hystricomorpha_ made their migration later, or these
two groups did not reach the isolated Patagonian section until later
than the first invasion. I am inclined to believe in the migration
being at a later period. This bridge does not explain the presence
of the edentates, for which there is every reason to believe that
they developed in situ. The Marsupial invasion must have been from
some other direction, or their presence in Africa has not yet been
discovered.
CHAPTER IV
UNGULATA
The systematic arrangement of the South American ungulates is of such
a nature that scarcely two students of these forms have agreed. I feel
that the Pyrotheridae are proboscideans as did Ameghino, but there
my agreement ends. The other varied groups I believe have a common
ancestry, their great divergencies being due to adaptations to the
greatly varied characters of the country they occupied. In spite of the
great variation they have certain features in common so that I agree
with those who have developed the term Notungulata to include them all.
From what source they originally came is not clear, but it seems to
me that these notungulates have more in common with what we know of
the African fauna of the Fayum than with any other fauna; so that my
feeling would be that these two faunas had a common ancestry at least,
and possibly the South American ungulates are derived from the African.
The lophiodont upper dentition, the bicrescentric lower molars with a
“pillar” in the posterior crescent, the development of the tympanic
bulla with the extension of the inflated cavity up into the squamosal
bone, the development of the post-tympanic portion of the squamosum,
and the general arrangement of the basicranial foramena indicate in my
mind that these notungulates have all risen from the same stock, and
that that stock had much in common with the hyracoids.
I should therefore arrange the various groups as follows.[11]
[Footnote 11: The following references discuss in detail the
arrangement of these forms. Ameghino, 1906, Formations Sedimentaires,
Anal. Museo Nac. de Buenos Aires, ser. 3, t. 8, p. 287-498: Roth, Los
Ungulados Sudamericanos, Anal. Mus. La Plata, t. 5, 1903, p. 1-36:
Scott, Princeton Patagonian Expeditions, vol. 6, p. 287-299, 1912:
Gregory, Bul. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist., vol. 27, p. 273-285, 1910.]
NOTUNGULATA
Order I. Upper molars composed of an external longitudinal
crest and two transverse crests, the posterior the
less developed; lower molars composed of two joining crescents
with a “pillar” in the posterior crescent; structure
of the feet and limbs varying.
Suborder 1. =Litopterna=: teeth brachydont to
hypsodont; lower molars with the anterior and posterior
crescents subequal; squamoso-periotic region not
inflated; limbs elongated; pes unguligrade; digits 3-3
or 1-1.
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