Fossil Sirenia from the Pleistocene of Qatar: new questions about the antiquity of sea cows in the Gulf Region

PeerJ

article

Nicholas D. Pyenson¹  Mehsin Al-Ansi³  Clare M. Fieseler¹  Khalid Hassan Al Jaber⁴  Katherine D. Klim¹  Jacques LeBlanc⁵  Ahmad Mujthaba Dheen Mohamed³  Ismail Al-Shaikh⁶  Christopher D. Marshall⁷ 

[1] Department of Paleobiology, Smithsonian Institution;Department of Paleontology and Geology;Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, Qatar University;National Museum of Qatar;Calgary;ExxonMobil Research Qatar;Department of Marine Biology, Texas A&M University-Galveston;Department of Ecology and Conservation Biology, Texas A&M University, College Station

关键词: Fossil record;    Sirenia;    Pleistocene;    Neogene;    Tethys Sea;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.14075

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

One of the largest and least documented populations of dugongs (Dugong dugon) resides in the coastal waters of the United Arab Emirates, and waters surrounding Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar. The archaeological record of dugongs in the Gulf Region is abundant, but little is known about their fossil record in the region. Here we report an isolated sirenian rib fragment from the Futaisi Member of the Fuwayrit Formation near the town of Al Ruwais, in northern Qatar. The Fuwayrit Formation is a marine Pleistocene deposit exposed onshore in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Based on the correlative dating of the basal Futaisi Member with other onshore platforms, the rib fragment is approximately 125 ka. We propose that this isolated rib (likely the first rib from the right side) belongs to Dugongidae, with strong similarities to extant Dugong. We cannot, however, eliminate the possibility that it belongs to an extinct taxon, especially given its similarities with other fossil dugongid material from both Qatar and elsewhere in the world. Aside from reflecting the presence of Gulf seagrass communities in the Pleistocene, this occurrence also suggests that different (and potentially multiple) lineages of sirenians inhabited the Gulf Region in the geologic past.

【 授权许可】

CC BY