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Palaeeudyptes
''Palaeeudyptes'' is an extinct genus of large penguins, currently containing four accepted species. They were probably larger than almost all living penguins, with the smaller species being about the size of an emperor penguin, and the largest species, ''Palaeeudyptes klekowskii'', estimated to reach long (Bird measurement, measuring tip of beak to tail) and weighed up to . Known species Of the four species, two (''P. gunnari'' and ''P. klekowskii'') are known from numerous remains found in Middle or Late Eocene strata (34 to 50 mya (unit), MYA) of the La Meseta Formation on Seymour Island, Antarctica. ''P. antarcticus'', the first fossil penguin described, is only really known from a single incomplete tarsometatarsus found in the Late Oligocene Otekaike Limestone (23 to 28, possibly up to 34 MYA) at Kakanui, New Zealand, but numerous other bones have been tentatively assigned to the species. The other described New Zealand species, ''P. marplesi'', is known from parts of a sk ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Palaeeudyptes Antarcticus
''Palaeeudyptes antarcticus'', also referred to as the narrow-flippered penguin, is the type (zoology), type species of the extinct penguin genus ''Palaeeudyptes''. It was a huge species, albeit probably with a large size variation. Although the size range can only be loosely estimated, the birds seem to have stood between high in life (''i.e.'' somewhat larger than an emperor penguin), placing this species and its congener ''Palaeeudyptes marplesi'' among the largest penguin species known. It was the last known ''Palaeeudyptes'' species, and although the exact time when it lived is not precisely determined, it may have evolved from ''P. marplesi'', or they might even have been a single species which slightly decreased in size over time. ''P. antarcticus'' was the first fossil penguin to become known to science. It was described from a single, slightly damaged, tarsometatarsus (British Museum, BM A.1084) found in the Late Oligocene Otekaike Limestone (23-28, possibly up to 34 mya ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Meseta Formation
The La Meseta Formation is a sedimentary sequence deposited during much of the Paleogene on Seymour Island off the coast of the Antarctic Peninsula. It is noted for its fossils, which include both marine organisms and the only terrestrial vertebrate fossils from the Cenozoic of Antarctica. In some treatments, the La Meseta Formation is restricted to just the older Thanetian to Lutetian-aged strata, with the younger Bartonian to Rupelian strata treated as the overlying Submeseta Formation. However, other papers instead treat the Submeseta Formation as an allomember of the La Meseta Formation. Description La Meseta Formation lies unconformably on the Cretaceous Lopez de Bertodano Formation. It is an approximately thick sequence of poorly consolidated sandstones and siltstones. The depositional environment was probably coastal, deltaic or estuarine in character. The top of the sequence is an erosional unconformity to Pleistocene glacial gravels. La Meseta Formation is one of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Palaeeudyptes Klekowskii
''Palaeeudyptes klekowskii'' is an extinct species of the penguin genus ''Palaeeudyptes''. It was previously thought to have been approximately the size of its congener ''Palaeeudyptes antarcticus'', somewhat larger than the modern emperor penguin, but a 2014 study showed it was in fact almost twice as tall, earning it the nickname “Mega Penguin”. Its maximum length is estimated to be up to and maximum body mass up to . Knowledge of it comes from an extensive collection of fossil bones from the Late Eocene (34-37 MYA) of the La Meseta Formation on Seymour Island, Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean (also known as the Antarctic Ocean), it contains the geographic South Pole. .... ''P. klekowskii'' was at first not recognized as a distinct species, and despite the coexistence of two so closely related species of similar size as '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Palaeeudyptes Marplesi
Marples' penguin (''Palaeeudyptes marplesi'') was a large species of the extinct penguin genus ''Palaeeudyptes''. It stood between high in life, larger than the present emperor penguin. The precise relationship between this species and the slightly smaller narrow-flippered penguin (''Palaeeudyptes antarcticus'') from somewhat younger rocks is not resolved; possibly, ''P. marplesi'' is a synonym or subspecies of ''P. antarcticus''. This species is known from a partial skeleton, mainly leg bones (Otago Museum C.50.25 to C.50.45), recovered from Middle or Late Eocene Burnside Mudstone rocks (34-40 MYA) at Burnside, Dunedin, in New Zealand. Many other bones are often assigned to this species. However, as most of them are only roughly dated and intermediate in size between this species and ''P. antarcticus'', they should not be referred to either taxon pending a comprehensive review of the New Zealand material of ''Palaeeudyptes'' (which will probably result in recognizing that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Palaeeudyptes Gunnari
''Palaeeudyptes gunnari'' is an extinct species of the extinct penguin genus ''Palaeeudyptes''. It was a bit smaller than its congener ''Palaeeudyptes antarcticus'' of New Zealand, standing between 110 and 125 cm high, approximately the size of the emperor penguin. It is known from dozens of fossil bones from Middle or Late Eocene strata (34-50 MYA) of the La Meseta Formation on Seymour Island, Antarctica. Initially, it was described as a separate genus, ''Eosphaeniscus''. However, this was based on a single weathered and broken tarsometatarsus The tarsometatarsus is a bone that is only found in the lower leg of birds and some non-avian dinosaurs. It is formed from the fusion of several bird bones found in other types of animals, and homologous to the mammalian tarsus (ankle bones) a .... Better material recovered later showed that the species belongs into the present genus. '' Wimanornis'' is probably a synonym of this species (Jadwiszcak, 2006). References * * My ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seymour Island
Seymour Island or Marambio Island, is an island in the chain of 16 major islands around the tip of the Graham Land on the Antarctic Peninsula. Graham Land is the closest part of Antarctica to South America. It lies within the section of the island chain that resides off the west side of the peninsula's northernmost tip. Within that section, it is separated from Snow Hill Island by Picnic Passage, and sits just east of the larger key, James Ross Island, and its smaller, neighboring island, Vega Island. Seymour Island is sometimes called Marambio Island or Seymour-Marambio Island, taking its resident Argentine base as its namesake (see section, #Base Antárctica Marambio, Base Antárctica Marambio, below). Sailing directions The US Defense Mapping Agency's ''Sailing Directions for Antarctica'' (1976) describes Seymour Island as follows: Historic site A wooden commemorative plaque, plaque and rock cairn stand at Penguins Bay, on the southern coast of Seymour Island. The pla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Penguin
Penguins are a group of aquatic flightless birds from the family Spheniscidae () of the order Sphenisciformes (). They live almost exclusively in the Southern Hemisphere. Only one species, the Galápagos penguin, is equatorial, with a small portion of its population extending slightly north of the equator (within a quarter degree of latitude). Highly adapted for life in the ocean water, penguins have countershaded dark and white plumage and flippers for swimming. Most penguins feed on krill, fish, squid and other forms of sea life which they catch with their bills and swallow whole while swimming. A penguin has a spiny tongue and powerful jaws to grip slippery prey. They spend about half of their lives on land and the other half in the sea. The largest living species is the emperor penguin (''Aptenodytes forsteri''): on average, adults are about tall and weigh . The smallest penguin species is the little blue penguin (''Eudyptula minor''), also known as the fairy pen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Australian Museum
The South Australian Museum is a natural history museum and research institution in Adelaide, South Australia, founded in 1856 and owned by the Government of South Australia. It occupies a complex of buildings on North Terrace in the cultural precinct of the Adelaide Parklands. Plans are under way to move much of its Australian Aboriginal cultural collection (the largest in the world), into a new National Gallery for Aboriginal Art and Cultures. History 19th century There had been earlier attempts at setting up mechanics' institutes in the colony, but they struggled to find buildings which could hold their library collections and provide spaces for lectures and entertainments. In 1856, the colonial government promised support for all institutes, in the form of provision the first government-funded purpose-built cultural institution building. The South Australian Institute, incorporating a public library and a museum, was established in 1861 in the rented premises of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tibiotarsus
The tibiotarsus is the large bone between the femur and the tarsometatarsus in the leg of a bird. It is the fusion of the proximal part of the tarsus with the tibia. A similar structure also occurred in the Mesozoic Heterodontosauridae. These small ornithischian dinosaurs were unrelated to birds and the similarity of their foot bones is best explained by convergent evolution. See also * Bird anatomy References * Proctor, Nobel S. ''Manual of Ornithology: Avian Structure and Function''. Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope .... (1993) Bird anatomy Dinosaur anatomy {{ornithology-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oligocene
The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch (geology), epoch of the Paleogene Geologic time scale, Period that extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but the exact dates of the start and end of the epoch are slightly uncertain. The name Oligocene was coined in 1854 by the German paleontologist Heinrich Ernst Beyrich from his studies of marine beds in Belgium and Germany. The name comes from Ancient Greek (''olígos'') 'few' and (''kainós'') 'new', and refers to the sparsity of Neontology, extant forms of Mollusca, molluscs. The Oligocene is preceded by the Eocene Epoch and is followed by the Miocene Epoch. The Oligocene is the third and final epoch of the Paleogene Period. The Oligocene is often considered an important time of transition, a link between the archaic world of the tropical Eocene and the more modern ecosystems of the Miocene. Major chang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Burnside, Otago
Burnside is a mainly industrial suburb of the New Zealand city of Dunedin. It is located at the mouth of a long valley, the Kaikorai Valley, through which flows the Kaikorai Stream. This valley stretches to the northeast for . Burnside is to the southwest of the city centre, close to eastern end of the much larger suburb, Green Island. Other suburbs located nearby include Concord, immediately to the southeast and Kenmure further up Kaikorai Valley. Burnside is separated from the central urban area of Dunedin by the large ridge which surrounds the city's heart. This ridge is part of the crater wall of the long-extinct Dunedin Volcano. The ridge lies immediately to the east of Burnside, with the main pass over it, the saddle of Lookout Point, lying to the east. Major industries Kempthorne Prosser & Co's New Zealand Drug Company Kempthorne Prosser's Burnside Chemical Works that made fertilisers from sulphuric acid opened in 1881 and were the first of its kind in the col ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
