''Goulmimichthys'' is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial n ...

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fishes, is a class of bony fish. They comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. The ray-finned fishes are so called because their fins are webs of skin supported by bony or h ...

es in the family Pachyrhizodontidae. The genus, first described by Cavin in 1995,''Goulmimichthys''
at

Fossilworks Fossilworks is a portal which provides query, download, and analysis tools to facilitate access to the Paleobiology Database, a large relational database assembled by hundreds of paleontologists from around the world. History Fossilworks was cre ...

.orgCavin, 1995, p.1049 is known from various

Turonian The Turonian is, in the ICS' geologic timescale, the second age in the Late Cretaceous Epoch, or a stage in the Upper Cretaceous Series. It spans the time between 93.9 ± 0.8 Ma and 89.8 ± 1 Ma (million years ago). The Turonian is preceded ...

age formations. The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen( ...

''G. arambourgi'' from the Akrabou Formation in the El Rachidia Province of

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria ...

,''Goulmimichthys''
at

GBIF The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is an international organisation that focuses on making scientific data on biodiversity available via the Internet using web services. The data are provided by many institutions from around th ...

.org and other fossils described are ''G. gasparini'' of the

La Frontera Formation The La Frontera Formation ( es, Formación La Frontera, K2F, Ksf) is a geological formation, part of the Villeta Group, of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense and neighbouring areas of the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes. The sequence of limeston ...

, Colombia, and ''G. roberti'' from the

Agua Nueva Formation The Agua Nueva Formation is a geologic formation in Mexico. It preserves fossils dating back to the upper part of the Cenomanian stage of the Cretaceous period. It consists "predominantly of alternating fossiliferous, organic matter-rich, lamina ...

of Mexico.

Etymology

The genus name ''Goulmimichthys'' is a combination of the Greek ''ichthys'', "fish" and

Goulmima Goulmima () is a town in Morocco situated in the province of Errachidia, in the region of Drâa-Tafilalet. An agricultural oasis, it is fed by the Wadi Gheris from the central High Atlas mountains. Like other settlements in Tafilalet, it was buil ...

, the city in Morocco where the holotype fossils were found. The species

epithet An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

of the type species ''arambourgi'' refers to

Camille Arambourg Camille Arambourg ( February 3, 1885– November 19, 1969) was a French vertebrate paleontologist. He conducted extensive field work in North Africa. In the 1950s he argued against the prevailing model of Neanderthals as brutish and simian. Du ...

, a French paleontologist who worked in North Africa. The species epithet ''gasparini'', given by

María Páramo María Euridice Páramo Fonseca (born 1953 in Bogotá, Colombia) is a Colombian paleontologist and geologist.Zulma Gasparini Zulma Nélida Brandoni de Gasparini (born 15 May 1944) is an Argentinian paleontologist and zoologist. She is known for discovering the fossils of the dinosaur '' Gasparinisaura'', which was named after her. Work Born in the city of La Plata, ...

.Hallan peces fosilizados en el Huila
/ref>

Description

The anterior process of the pelvic bone of ''Goulmimichthys'' has the same length as the four central abdominal vertebrae, a typical characteristic of the genus.Alvarado et al., 2006, p.269 The species ''G. roberti'' is known from disarticulated and articulated specimens.González & Arratia, 2010, p.125

Distribution and habitat

Fossils of the type species of ''Goulmimichthys'' have been described from the Lower Turonian Akrabou Formation near

in eastern

.Bardet et al., 2008, p.613 Other species are described from the Turonian

near

Yaguará Yaguará () is a town and municipality in the Huila Department, Colombia. The urban centre is located at an elevation of in the Magdalena River Valley and the Eastern Ranges of the Colombian Andes. The municipality borders Teruel and Palermo in th ...

, Huila, in the

Eastern Ranges The Eastern Ranges is an Australian rules football team in the NAB League, the Victorian statewide under-18s competition. The club is a founding member of the competition (1992) and has produced several players for the Australian Football Le ...

of the Colombian

Andes The Andes, Andes Mountains or Andean Mountains (; ) are the longest continental mountain range in the world, forming a continuous highland along the western edge of South America. The range is long, wide (widest between 18°S – 20°S ...

,Castelblanco & Vásquez, 2016 and the

of the

Lagerstätte A Lagerstätte (, from ''Lager'' 'storage, lair' '' Stätte'' 'place'; plural ''Lagerstätten'') is a sedimentary deposit that exhibits extraordinary fossils with exceptional preservation—sometimes including preserved soft tissues. These for ...

Vallecillo in northeastern

Mexico Mexico ( Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guate ...

.Blanco & Cavin, 2003, p.299 The fossil fishes were found in associations with other fossil genera, as in Mexico '' Nursallia gutturosum'', '' Rhynchodercetis regio'', '' Tselfatia formosa'', '' Vallecillichthys multivertebratum'',González et al., 2013, p.19 in Morocco '' Ghrisichthys'' and ''

Enchodus ''Enchodus'' (from el, ἔγχος , 'spear' and el, ὀδούς 'tooth') is an extinct genus of aulopiform ray-finned fish related to lancetfish and lizardfish. Species of ''Enchodus'' flourished during the Late Cretaceous, and survived the ...

'',Cavin et al., 2015 and in Colombia '' Pachyrhizodus etayoi'' and '' Bachea huilensis''. Alongside the fossil fish assemblages, the fossils of plesiosaurs as '' Mauriciosaurus fernandezi'' and '' Vallecillosaurus donrobertoi'' in Mexico, the

mosasaur Mosasaurs (from Latin ''Mosa'' meaning the 'Meuse', and Ancient Greek, Greek ' meaning 'lizard') comprise a group of extinct, large marine reptiles from the Late Cretaceous. Their first fossil remains were discovered in a limestone quarry at Ma ...

'' Yaguarasaurus columbianus'' in Colombia and the basal mosasaur '' Tethysaurus nopcsai'' and

turtle Turtles are an order of reptiles known as Testudines, characterized by a special shell developed mainly from their ribs. Modern turtles are divided into two major groups, the Pleurodira (side necked turtles) and Cryptodira (hidden necked ...

s in Morocco were recovered.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * {{Taxonbar, from=Q52158590 Crossognathiformes Cretaceous fish Turonian life Prehistoric fish of Africa Late Cretaceous animals of Africa Cretaceous Morocco Fossils of Morocco Late Cretaceous fish of North America Cretaceous Mexico Fossils of Mexico Prehistoric fish of South America Late Cretaceous animals of South America Cretaceous Colombia Fossils of Colombia Fossil taxa described in 1995