Tarrantites, a new heteromorph ammonite genus from the Albian of Texas and Pakistan

 

 

Herbert Christian Klinger^I; William James Kennedy^II; Keith P. Minor^III

^INatural History Collections Department, Iziko South African Museum, P.O. Box 61, Cape Town, 8000 South Africa and Department of Geological Sciences, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, Rondebosch, 7701 South Africa. E-mail: hklinger@iziko.org.za
^IIOxford University Museum of Natural History, Parks Road, Oxford 0X1 3PW, U.K. E-mail: jim.kennedy@oum.ox.ac.uk
^IIITexas Research Institute, Austin, 415 Crystal Creek Drive, Austin TX78746, U.S.A. E-mail: kminor@tri-austin.com

 

 

---

ABSTRACT

A new heteromorph ammonite genus, Tarrantites, is proposed for Hamites adkinsi Scott, 1928. The description of the new genus is based mainly on a near-complete specimen from the Middle Albian part of the Goodland Limestone of Tarrant County, Texas, the holotype, and on an abraded mould on a pebble from the bed of a stream in Hill County, Texas. In addition, we record the presence of the genus in the Albian of Pakistan. Tarrantites shows a remarkable resemblance to the labeceratine genera Labeceras Spath, 1925 and Myloceras Spath, 1925: in coiling and size to the former, and in ornamentation to the latter, but is excluded from the subfamily Labeceratinae Spath, 1925, because it has a distinct bifid adventive (A) lobe. This latter feature, and the ornamentation, rather suggest affinities of Tarrantites with the family Anisoceratidae Hyatt, 1900.

Keywords: Albian, heteromorph ammonite, Tarrantites, Anisoceratidae, labeceratine homoeomorph, Texas, Pakistan.

---

 

 

“Full text available only in PDF format”

 

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We thank Arthur Busbey at the Department of Geology at Texas Christian University for loan of the specimens TCU1046 and TCU1144. We also thank Ann Molineux at the Texas Natural Science Center at the University of Texas at Austin for loan of the specimen NPL19654. Klinger thanks the National Research Foundation, South Africa, for financial assistance. Kennedy acknowledges the technical support of the staff of the Department of Earth Sciences, Oxford and the Oxford University Museum of Natural History.

 

REFERENCES

ADKINS, W.S. 1928. Handbook of Texas Cretaceous fossils. University of Texas Bulletin 2838: 1-385.         [ Links ]

AGUIRRE URRETA, M.B. & RICCARDI, A.C. 1988. Albian heteromorph ammonoids from southern Patagonia, Argentina. Journal of Paleontology 62: 598-614.         [ Links ]

CLARK, D.L. 1965. Heteromorph ammonoids from the Albian and Cenomanian of Texas and adjacent areas. (Geological Society of America Memoir 95: viii+1-99.         [ Links ]

COOPER, M.R. & KENNEDY, W.J., 1979. Uppermost Albian (Stoliczkaia dispar Zone) ammonites from the Angolan littoral. Annals of the South African Museum 77: 175-308.         [ Links ]

FÖLLMI, K.B. 1989. Beschreibung neugefundener Ammonoidea aus der Vorarlberger Garschella-Formation (Aptian-Albian). Jahrbuch der Geologischen Bundesanstalt Wien 132: 105-189.         [ Links ]

FÖRSTER, R. 1975. Die geologische Entwicklung von Süd-Mozambique seit der Unterkreide und die Ammoniten-Fauna von Unterkreide und Cenoman. Geologisches Jahrbuch B12: 3-324.         [ Links ]

GILL, T. 1871. Arrangement of the families of Mollusks. Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections 227: xvi + 1-49.         [ Links ]

HYATT, A. 1900. Cephalopoda. p. 502-592. In: ZITTEL, K.A. von. Textbook of Paleontology, 1st English edn. Translated by C.R. Eastman. MacMillan: London & New York.         [ Links ]

KENNEDY, W.J. 1972. The affinities of Idiohamites ellipticoides Spath (Cretaceous Ammonoidea). Palaeontology15: 400-404.         [ Links ]

KENNEDY, W.J. & KLINGER, H.C. 1975. Cretaceous faunas from Zululand and Natal, South Africa. Introduction, Stratigraphy. Bulletin of the British Museum of Natural History (Geology) 25: 263-315.         [ Links ]

KLINGER, H.C. 1976. Cretaceous heteromorph ammonites from Zululand. Memoir of the Geological Survey ofSouth Africa 69: ix + 1-142.         [ Links ]

KLINGER, H.C. 1989. The ammonite subfamily Labeceratinae Spath, 1925; systematics, phylogeny, dimorphism and distribution (with a description of a new species). Annals of the South African Museum 98: 189-219.         [ Links ]

KLINGER, H.C. & KENNEDY, W.J. 2008. Mkuzeiella andersoni gen. et sp. nov. (Cephalopoda, Ammonoidea) from the Albian Mzinene Formation of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Bulletin de l'Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique, Sciences de la Terre 78: 179-191.         [ Links ]

KLINGER, H.C. & KENNEDY, W.J. 2009. The heteromorph ammonite Ndumuiceras variabile gen. et sp. nov. from the Albian Mzinene Formation, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. African Natural History, 5: 43-47.         [ Links ]

KORN, D., EBBIGHAUSEN, V., BOCKWINKEL, J. & KLUG, C. 2003. The A-mode sutural ontogeny of prolecanitid ammonoids. Palaeontology 46: 1123-1132.         [ Links ]

KULLMANN, J. & WIEDMANN, J. 1970. Significance of sutures in phylogeny of Ammonoidea. University of Kansas, Paleontological Contributions 42: 1-32.         [ Links ]

MONKS, N., 2002. Cladistic analysis of a problematic ammonite group: the Hamitidae (Cretaceous, Albian-Turonian) and proposals for new cladistic terms. Palaeontology 45: 689-707.         [ Links ]

OWEN, H. 1970. The stratigraphy of the Gault in the Thames Estuary and its bearing on the Mesozoic tectonic history of the area. Proceedings of the Geologists' Association 82: 187-209.         [ Links ]

PARKINSON, J. 1811. The Fossil Starfish, Echini, Shells, Insect, Amphibia, Mammalia &c. The Organic Remains of a Former World, vol. 3, Sherwood, Neely and Jones: London.         [ Links ]

SCOTT, G., 1928. Ammonites of the genus Dipoloceras, and a new Hamites from the Texas Cretaceous. Journal of Paleontology 2: 108-118.         [ Links ]

SOWERBY, J. 1812-1846. In: SOWERBY, J. & SOWERBY, J. De C. The mineral Conchology of Great Britain. Meredith: London.         [ Links ]

SPATH, L.F. 1925. On Upper Albian Ammonoidea from Portuguese East Africa. With an appendix on Upper Cretaceous Ammonites from Maputoland. Annals of the Transvaal Museum 11:179-200.         [ Links ]

SPATH, L.F. 1930. The fossil fauna of the Samana Range and some neighbouring areas, part V. The Lower Cretaceous Ammonoidea; with notes on Albian Cephalopoda from Hazara. Memoirs of the Geological Survey of India, Palaeontologia Indica, new series, 15: 51-66.         [ Links ]

SPATH, L.F. 1939. A monograph of the Ammonoidea of the Gault. Part 13. Palaeontographical Society Monograph 93: 541-608.         [ Links ]

SPATH, L.F., 1941. A monograph of the Ammonoidea of the Gault. Part 14. Palaeontographical Society Monograph 95: 609-668.         [ Links ]

SWENSEN, A.J. 1963. Anisoceratidae and Hamitidae (Ammonoidea) from the Cretaceous ofTexas and Utah. Brigham Young University Geology Studies 9: 53-82.         [ Links ]

WIEDMANN, J. 1966. Stammesgeschichte und System der Posttriadischen Ammonoideen. Ein Überblick. 2. Teil. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen 127: 13-81.         [ Links ]

 

 

Received 12 March 2010
Accepted 30 March 2010