A diverse Wuchiapingian brachiopod fauna, which contains 57 species in 28 genera, is described from the Shuizhutang Formation at the Liannan section, Guangdong province, southeastern China. Four new species Tyloplecta liannanensis n. sp., Linoproductus huananensis n. sp., Araxathyris minor n. sp., and Permophricodothyris flata n. sp. are proposed. From well-preserved Liannan specimens, characteristics of the shell microstructures in Permianella are revised, and different morphologies of muscle scars in Permophricodothyris are distinctly shown. Until now, only several Wuchiapingian brachiopod faunas have been found in South China. Compared with these faunas, the Liannan fauna shows much higher α diversity and is more like faunas from southeastern China than those from the Yangtze area in faunal composition. The Liannan fauna is dominated with Neochonetes, Transennatia, Orthothetina, Permophricodothyris, and Cathaysia, which are normally larger and more strongly ornamented than their Changhsingian counterparts. The Wuchiapingian brachiopods in South China are represented mainly by the Douling fauna and Shuizhutang fauna. The Douling fauna has relatively low diversity and presents the survival stage after the Guadalupian–Lopingian boundary crisis. The Shuizhutang fauna has a much higher diversity and more key Changhsingian taxa and shows a rapid radiation stage. Faunal compositions of the two faunas indicate that the initial recovery of brachiopods occurred mainly at the genus level followed by a more rapid radiation at both genus and species levels.

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The holotype of the errant polychaete annelid Trentonia shegiriana Pickerill and Forbes, 1978 from the Middle Ordovician Trenton Group of the Quebec City area, Quebec, Canada (see Pickerill and Forbes, 1978, fig. 1, p. 660), and subsequently figured in Boardman et al. (1987, fig. 12.4, p. 199), has now been reposited in the Division of Natural Sciences, New Brunswick Museum, Saint John, New Brunswick, with the catalog number NBMG 6501. Although the Trenton Group in this area has yielded additional annelids of uncertain affinity (Conway Morris et al., 1982), the holotype of T. shegiriana still represents the only known specimen despite a further decade of investigation. At the time of publication, a repository for the specimen was unavailable, but Dr. R. Miller, Curator for Paleontological Collections, has now arranged to receive the specimen.

Oligocene landscapes of New Mexico were dominated by andesite stratovolcanoes and resurgent domes of ash-flow tuff (ignimbrite) cauldrons (Smith et al., 1985). This pervasive volcanism produced volcanic and volcaniclastic rocks that have been neglected by vertebrate paleontologists, so that, until now, no Oligocene vertebrate fossils have been discovered in New Mexico. This documents the initial results of vertebrate paleontological investigations of Oligocene rocks in New Mexico, a lower jaw of the oromerycid artiodactyl Montanatylopus matthewi, the first Oligocene mammal from the state. In this paper, CM = Carnegie Museum of Natural History and UNM = University of New Mexico.

Propeamussium (Parvamussium) holzense n. sp. and Propeamussium (Parvamussium) robinsonense n. sp. are described from the Upper Cretaceous Holz Shale Member of the Ladd Formation, Santa Ana Mountains, southern California. These species occur with Bostrychoceras elongatum (Whiteaves), Glyptoxoceras subcompressum (Forbes), and Inoceramus orientalus (Sokolow), which are indicative of a late medial Santonian age (Bostrychoceras elongatum Biochron). Propeamussium (Parvamussium) cowperi (Waring), from the Campanian Chatsworth Formation of the Simi Hills, southern California, is also redescribed and reillustrated for comparative purposes.

A single specimen of the new dictyonine hexactinellid species Verrucocoelia biswasi was collected from the Middle Eocene Fulra Limestone from Lakhpat Fort, Kutch, western India. The euretoid species is broadly bowl-shaped, 7–8 cm wide and 5–6 cm high, with walls of branched to weakly anastomosed tubes that extend upward and outward from a simple, unfluted, walled spongocoel. Skeletal strands diverge upward and outward from near the gastral surface of each tube. The sponge occurs in silty tan marl with abundant alveolinids and less common other large foraminifera, bivalves, and gastropods in sediments thought to have accumulated in a quiet, sheltered environment, possibly a lagoon.

The late Silurian Arceoaster hintei new genus new species (Asteroidea, Echinodermata) is based on a single complete specimen from the lower Hunton Group of southern Oklahoma. Overall ossicular arrangement enables assignment of the new genus to the Paleozoic stem-family Hudsonasteridae; however, Arceoaster n. gen. is homeomorphic with members of the post-Paleozoic crown-group Goniasteridae. Because Arceoaster n. gen. is a hudsonasterid, and because similar morphologic expressions are not known among described taxa from later in the Paleozoic or the early Mesozoic, similarities between Arceoaster n. gen. and later genera are homoplastic, thereby providing an example of iterative evolution within Asteroidea. The Arceoaster n. gen. specimen is associated with a rich and diverse invertebrate fauna typical of its time interval and environmental setting; nothing suggests an unusual habitat. Selective pressures leading to homoplasy are conjectural, although robust construction among extant asteroids has been associated with a defensive life strategy.

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The genus Collarothyris was erected by Modzalevskaya in 1970 (p. 155) with Meristella canaliculata Wenjukow, 1899, as type species. Wenjukow (1899) did not designate a type; however, on p. 143 he gave the measurements of two specimens, one of which was figured on Plate VII, figure 21, and designated holotype by Modzalevskaya (1970, p. 156). Unfortunately, this specimen is lost (see also Nikiforova, Modzalevskaya, and Bassett, 1985). Further checking of the collections of the Geological Museum of the Geological Institute of Science, Kiev (Ukrania), resulted in finding, among Wenjukow's (1899) original collection, one specimen (No. 367/165) labelled as Meristella canaliculata and whose measurements coincide with one of those given by Wenjukow (1899, p. 143). This specimen is here figured (Figure 1) and selected lectotype of Collarothyris canaliculata (Wenjukow).

Fossil fish are poorly represented in middle Lower Devonian deposits of the western United States. Here we describe vertebrate microremains from mid-Pragian levels in the Kobeh Member, McColley Canyon Formation, central Nevada. The species diversity of the assemblages is low and dominated by the acanthodian Nostolepis costata Goujet, 1976. This species is found in older (late Lochkovian–early Pragian) deposits in France and Spain and mid-Pragian or slightly younger deposits in Saudi Arabia. This distribution suggests dispersal to the west from the Armorica terrane around the south of Laurussia to the Nevada region, and southeastward to Arabia, on the northern margin of Gondwana.

A new species of Oikozetetes, O. mounti n. sp. is described from the upper Mernmerna Formation (equivalent to Cambrian Series 2) in the eastern Flinders Ranges, South Australia. Description of both shell morphotypes (morph A and B) from the same stratigraphic horizon favors the interpretation of a two-shelled scleritome for Oikozetetes. Identification of at least two types of halkieriid sclerite (palmates and siculates) in stratigraphic association with the Halkieria-like shells of Oikozetetes suggests that these elements are derived from the same scleritome. This provides evidence against previous suggestions that the Gondwanan species was aspiculate; the scleritome arrangement is interpreted to be similar to Halkieria evangelista Conway Morris and Peel, 1995 and supports placement in the family Halkieriidae Poulsen, 1967. Comparison of modes of accretionary growth in Oikozetetes shell morphotypes to Halkieria shells and terminal plates in modern polyplacophorans, supports a scleritome model that places shell morphs A and B in posterior and anterior locations, respectively, along the axis of the body.

The highly fossiliferous St. Marys Formation is exposed along Calvert Cliffs, Maryland, and comprises one of the best available records of late Miocene life in the northeastern United States. Rachycentron stremphaencus new species, a cobia from the late Miocene (Tortonian) of the St. Marys Formation is described herein on the basis of a single three-dimensional neurocranium. This fossil represents the earliest known occurrence of neurocranial remains of the genus Rachycentron in the record. Rachycentron stremphaencus differs from Rachycentron canadum (Linnaeus, 1766) in many ways. The most obvious include a different ornamentation of the outer surface of the cranial bones; a notably pronounced lateral ridge resulting in a considerable gradient from the dorsal-medial exposure of the frontal to its lateralmost supraorbital margin; the size, shape, and position of the sphenotic that is located in the posterior half of the neurocranium and its lateralmost edge being adjacent to the anteriormost extent of the wedge-shaped trough in the dorsal surface of the skull formed by the lateral and medial ridges; the two contralateral medial ridges forming a proportionately much wider trough on either side of the supraoccipital; the epioccipitals not reaching the rear edge of the neurocranium; and the lack of a conspicuous posterolateral prong of the intercalar.

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Recognition of a fossil previously identified as a “large Cretaceous beetle” as a glypheid lobster permits the definition of a new species, Glyphea wiffenae. The specimen was collected from the richly fossiliferous, Upper Cretaceous Maungataniwa Sandstone in eastern North Island, New Zealand. Several other fossil decapods with high southern latitude affinities have been described previously from the unit, supporting the placement of the Zealandia region within the Weddellian Biotic Province. This is only the fourth glypheid known from New Zealand and the first Cretaceous occurrence of the genus in the country.

Amphissites insignis Croneis and Thurman, 1939, is a readily identifiable ostracode species because of the unique configuration of carinae and ridges on the surface of the valves. The species had adapted to both shale and limestone environments of deposition, has a wide geographic distribution in the United States (Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Montana, Nevada, Tennessee, and Texas), and is confined to the uppermost part of the Chesterian Series (foraminiferal zones 18 and 19). The description of this species is amended and specimens are illustrated for the first time from Nevada, Montana, Arkansas, and Tennessee, indicating that the species is a biostratigraphic indicator of the uppermost part of the Chesterian sedimentary sequence. Ontogenetic development of A. insignis is reconstructed. A. sp. 1 (Late Mississippian) and A. sp. 2 (Early Pennsylvanian) are illustrated in open nomenclature.

Lower Silurian conodonts were recovered from carbonate beds in the upper Zalaa and lower Sharchuluut formations at Yamaan Us in the Shine Jinst region, Gobi-Altai Zone, of southwestern Mongolia. Conodonts are described from the Zalaa Formation for the first time; key taxa recovered include Distomodus kentuckyensis Branson and Branson, 1947, Ozarkodina hassi (Pollock, Rexroad, and Nicoll, 1970), Pranognathus siluricus (Pollock, Rexroad, and Nicoll, 1970), and Pseudolonchodina expansa (Armstrong, 1990). These species constrain the onset of the Silurian carbonate platform, upper Zalaa to lower Sharchuluut formations, to the Pranognathus tenuis Zone, middle Aeronian. The presence of a cosmopolitan conodont fauna places these strata from the Gobi-Altai Zone in a basin-shelf marine setting with connection and circulation to the open ocean during the Llandovery.

The trilobite species Cryphaeus nicholsi Roy, 1929, was based on two pygidia from a Devonian red sandstone bed at Patacamaya, La Paz Department, Bolivia. Study of the syntypes (Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago) reveals that two well-known species are represented.

Chlamydotheca llanoensis is a new species of freshwater ostracode found in latest Pleistocene (12,000–10,000 years B.P.) fluviatile sediments on the Southern High Plains. At the type locality (Lubbock Lake Archaeological Site, Lubbock County, Texas) and at two other localities, C. llanoensis was associated with streamside Paleo-Indian artifacts. This easily recognized species should be a useful guide fossil for correlation of strata of similar environment and age on the Southern High Plains.

The morphology and growth habits of Evactinopora species of the Evactinoporidae (new family) are documented. This distinctive family of free-living bryozoans has a radial colony form at all growth stages. During a brief attachment phase on a hard substrate, the colony morphology grew as an expanding cone with vertical folds. Following detachment of the nascent colony from this hard substrate, it settled on soft sediment and the free-living expanding colony acquired a star-like form by producing slender outrigger rays. Continued growth produced a radial array of vertical vanes containing feeding autozooecia. The colony maintained a vertical orientation on soft sediment by means of outrigger rays and secretion of solid skeleton on the colony base that provided ballast. The radial growth pattern, outrigger rays, and vertical vanes developed as adaptive characters suitable for free-living life on soft sediment. North American species of Evactinopora are redefined and described taxonomically on the basis of zoarial and zooecial characters and a new species, Evactinopora mangeri, erected. The new family Evactinoporidae is established on the basis of the novel characters of early colony detachment from a hard surface, radial growth pattern through life, generation of outrigger rays, and growth of vertical vanes from the top of rays.

UUID: http://zoobank.org/d2cf3b6d-72d2-49d5-afa0-c08710af7874

The fossil record of octocorals from Cenozoic marine strata of western North America is quite limited, and they have not been reported previously from rocks in Washington State, USA. Two late Oligocene specimens from the upper part of the Lincoln Creek Formation in western Washington, referred to Radicipes? sp., are the first fossil record of the family Chrysogorgiidae. The family Isididae is represented by an internode and two holdfasts identified as Isidella sp. collected from the Oligocene Pysht Formation, along with specimens questionably identified as Lepidisis sp., possibly the first fossil record for this genus. Together, these are the first confirmed fossils of the Alcyonacea from north of California in western North America. The axes of sea pens from several late Eocene or early Oligocene localities in the Lincoln Creek Formation in the central part of western Washington, and the Pysht and Makah formations on the north side of the Olympic Peninsula, are the first fossil record for the Pennatulacea from western North America; all are tentatively referred to the genus ‘Graphularia’. Large axes from the Lincoln Creek Formation and Makah Formation are referred to ‘Graphularia’ (?) aff. sasai, because they are similar to the species known only from late Eocene and early Oligocene rocks in Japan.