Gastropoda

Tattersfield, Peter

doi:10.1007/978-90-481-9962-4_22

Cited by 2 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…The ichnofacies develops on carbonate‐rich palaeosols. The preservation of land snails (Tattersfield ) along with insect trace fossils is common (Genise ; Genise et al . ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Walking on ashes: insect trace fossils from Laetoli indicate poor grass cover associated with early hominin environments

Genise

Harrison

2018

Palaeontology

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More than 4000 insect trace fossils collected in recent years from Pliocene deposits at Laetoli in northern Tanzania provide new insights on early hominin palaeoenvironments. These trace fossils include: Fictovichnus gobiensis, Coprinisphaera murguiai, C. kheprii, Coprinisphaera ispp., Quirogaichnus isp., Teisseirei linguatus isp. nov., Celliforma ritchiei isp. nov., C. spirifer, C. germanica, C. cfr. curvata, Celliforma ispp., Rosellichnus isp., Vondrichnus planoglobus, Laetolichnus kwekai igen. et isp. nov. and Krausichnidae indet. They reveal that at least one species of moth, three dung beetles and five other coleopterans, nine taxa of solitary bees, and an indeterminate number of taxa of termites inhabited the Lower Laetolil environments. The Upper Laetolil environments, which have yielded a rich diversity of vertebrate fossils, including the early hominin Australopithecus afarensis and its putative footprints, supported several taxa of termites, one dung beetle, five other coleopterans, and eleven taxa of bees. The Upper Ndolanya environments, which have yielded the hominin Paranthropus aethiopicus, record four taxa of dung beetles, four other coleopterans, and two taxa of bees. The record of larval mortality and lack of intruder activity, revealed by the absence of emergence and intruder traces, may be associated with the anoxic/hypoxic conditions caused by the instantaneous burial of soils under thick volcanic ashes. The record of the Celliforma Ichnofacies in the Upper Laetolil environments indicates the dominance of shrubland to woodland with limited grass cover. This is supported also by the absence of Coprinisphaera, which suggests a scarcity of fresh grasses and a low abundance of large mammal grazers.

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“…The ichnofacies develops on carbonate‐rich palaeosols. The preservation of land snails (Tattersfield ) along with insect trace fossils is common (Genise ; Genise et al . ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…; Bishop et al . ; Denys ; Kaiser ; Kingston ; Harrison ; Rossouw & Scott ; Bamford , ; Su ; Tattersfield ). The Celliforma Ichnofacies suggests the dominance of shrublands and open woodlands, where bees found well insolated soils to nest (Fig.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Walking on ashes: insect trace fossils from Laetoli indicate poor grass cover associated with early hominin environments

Genise

Harrison

2018

Palaeontology

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“…Pliocene fossil taxa with their extant analogues, their potential value as habitat indicators, and their stratigraphic occurrences. Occurrences are from [1] with the record of Pupoides coenopictus from [14]. The Upper Laetolil Beds are here treated as a single unit.…”

Section: Pliocene Fossil Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Its objectives are to describe the mollusc faunas associated with the main vegetation types currently present in the area, from forest to grassland, and to relate variation in the faunas to environmental conditions, including climate. This is relevant to both current conservation and the palaeoenvironmental reconstruction of fossil sites in the area, in which terrestrial molluscs are often abundant [ 1 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Laetoli, Tanzania: Extant terrestrial mollusc faunas shed new light on climate and palaeoecology at a Pliocene hominin site

Tattersfield,

Rowson,

Ngereza

et al. 2024

PLoS ONE

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Laetoli, Tanzania is one of the most important palaeontological and palaeoanthropological localities in Africa. We report on a survey of the extant terrestrial gastropod faunas of the Laetoli-Endulen area, examine their ecological associations and re-examine the utility of Pliocene fossil molluscs in palaeoenvironmental reconstruction. Standardised collecting at 15 sites yielded 7302 individuals representing 58 mollusc species. Significant dissimilarities were found among the faunas of three broad habitat types: forest, woodland/bushland and open (grassland and scattered, xeric shrubland). Overall, more species were recorded in the woodland/bushland sites than in the forest sites. Open sites were less diverse. Environmental factors contributing most strongly to the separation of habitat types were aridity index and elevation. The results are supplemented with new mollusc data from the Mbulu Plateau south of Lake Eyasi, and compared to the list of species cumulatively recorded from the Ngorongoro area. Some regional variation is apparent and historical factors may explain the absence of some fossil taxa from Laetoli today. Differences in seasonality separated upland forest sites on the Mbulu plateau from those at Lemagurut at Laetoli. Indicator species were identified for each habitat. These included several large-bodied species analogous to the Laetoli Pliocene fossil species that were then used for palaeoenvironmental reconstruction. Based on the estimated aridity index, and adopting the widely used United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) global climate classification, the four stratigraphic subunits of the Upper Laetolil Beds (3.6–3.85 Ma) would be placed in either the UNEP’s Dry Sub-humid or Semi-arid climate classes, whereas the Upper Ndolanya Beds (2.66 Ma) and Lower Laetolil Beds (3.85-<4.36 Ma) would be assigned to the Humid and Semi-arid climate classes respectively. Pliocene precipitation at Laetoli is estimated as 847–965 mm per year, refining previous estimates. This is close or slightly higher than the present mean annual precipitation, and is likely to have corresponded to a mosaic of forest, woodland and bushland within a grassland matrix consistent with other reconstructions.

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Gastropoda

Cited by 2 publications

References 16 publications

Walking on ashes: insect trace fossils from Laetoli indicate poor grass cover associated with early hominin environments

Walking on ashes: insect trace fossils from Laetoli indicate poor grass cover associated with early hominin environments

Laetoli, Tanzania: Extant terrestrial mollusc faunas shed new light on climate and palaeoecology at a Pliocene hominin site

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