The Cuban crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer) from late Quaternary underwater cave deposits in the Dominican Republic /

Abstract

Late Quaternary fossils representing a locally extinct population of the Cuban crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer) are reported from two underwater caves in the Dominican Republic. A large fossil sample of C. rhombifer, from Oleg's Bat Cave near Bavaro in the southeastern Dominican Republic, consists of four nearly complete skulls, numerous isolated cranial elements and mandibles, and more than 100 postcranial bones representing most of the skeleton. These fossils were collected from a completely submerged portion of the cave at a depth of 11 m and about 100 m from the nearest entrance. A skull, mandibles, and two vertebrae of a Cuban crocodile were also found in a second cave called Ni-Rahu, northeast of Santo Domingo.We identify the fossil crocodile skulls from the Dominican Republic as Crocodylus rhombifer because they share the following characters with modern skulls of C. rhombifer from Cuba (as well as fossil skulls from Cuba, the Bahamas, and Cayman Islands): short, broad, and deep rostrum; large orbits; convex nasals along the midline (midrostral boss); prominent swelling

The Cuban Crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer) from Late Quaternary Underwater Cave Deposits in the Dominican Republic

“…Island (Morgan and Albury, 2013;Steadman et al, 2017). Two partial maxillae and a frontal from Crooked Island are certainly C. rhombifer, but as with most other fragmentary crocodile fossils from caves in the West Indies, the specimens from Great Exuma and Rum Cay can be identified only as crocodylian, although they probably represent C. rhombifer as well.…”

“…As a result of this dry cave bias, crocodiles were rare in the West Indian fossil record before paleontologists began expanding their search parameters for vertebrate fossils over the past 30 years. Quaternary fossil deposits from the West Indies now include: wet sites, such as under¬ water caves in the Dominican Republic and throughout the Bahamas (Franz et al, 1995;Stead¬ man et al, 2007;Rosenberger et al, 2011;Morgan and Albury, 2013;Velazco et al, 2013;Albury et al, 2018); several types of open sites (i.e., noncaves), such as peat deposits on Grand Cayman, Abaco, and Grand Bahama Morgan, 1994;Morgan and Albury, 2013;Steadman et al, 2014); and a natural asphalt or tar pit deposit in Cuba (Iturralde-Vinent et al, 2000). An additional source of crocodile remains is from Amerindian archaeological sites, especially in the Bahamas (Wing, 1977;Keegan, 1988Keegan, , 1992Keegan, , 1997Carr et al, 2006;Stead¬ man et al, 2014Stead¬ man et al, , 2017.…”

“…Based on the available radiocarbon chronology (Hastings et al, 2014), it appears that crocodiles inhabited these Bahamian blue holes primarily during the Holocene when the caves became flooded as sea levels rose. Sawmill Sink, a blue hole on Abaco, has produced numerous well-preserved fossil skeletons of Crocodylus rhombifer (Morgan and Albury, 2013), as well as complete shells of a large extinct land tortoise, Chelonoidis alburyorum (Franz and Franz, 2009).…”

“…In a previous study of fossil C. rhombifer from Abaco and Grand Cayman, Morgan and Albury (2013) suggested that the smaller size of the crocodiles on those two islands was related to limited food resources, which was primarily a result of their smaller land area and reduced ecological diversity compared to Cuba. However, this hypothesis does not provide an adequate explanation for the smaller size of crocodiles from the Dominican Republic, as the island of Hispaniola is similar in ecological diversity to Cuba and nearly as large.…”

Fossil Land Tortoises (Testudines: Testudinidae) from the Dominican Republic, West Indies, with a Description of a New Species

“…All tortoise popula¬ tions in the West Indies are currently extinct and the crocodiles and tortoises, once part of the island megafauna, played significant roles in the ecology of the West Indies (Hastings et al, 2014). Cuban crocodiles (C. rhombifer) are reported as fossils, from Olegs Bat Cave, the same crocodilian species found as fossils in blue holes in the Bahamas (Morgan and Albury, 2013;Morgan et al, in review).…”