The White River Fauna are
fossil
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...
animals found in the
White River Badlands of
South Dakota
South Dakota (; Sioux language, Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the West North Central states, North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota people, Lakota and Dakota peo ...
,
Wyoming
Wyoming () is a U.S. state, state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the south ...
,
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...
and
Nebraska
Nebraska () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Kansas to the south; Colorado to the southwe ...
in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
including
Badlands National Park
Badlands National Park ( lkt, Makȟóšiča) is an American national park located in southwestern South Dakota. The park protects of sharply eroded buttes and pinnacles, along with the largest undisturbed mixed grass prairie in the United State ...
.
The fossils have been found in the
White River Formation
The White River Formation is a geologic formation of the Paleogene Period, in the northern Great Plains and central Rocky Mountains, within the United States.
It has been found in northeastern Colorado, Dawes County in western Nebraska, Badlands ...
,
Chadron Formation
Chadron Formation is a rock formation in North Dakota, South Dakota, northwestern Nebraska, and eastern Wyoming. It is named after the town of Chadron, Nebraska
Chadron ( ) is a city and the county seat of Dawes County, in the state of Nebras ...
,
Brule Formation
The Brule Formation was deposited between 33 and 30 million years ago, roughly the Rupelian age (Oligocene). It occurs as a subunit of the White River Formation in Nebraska, Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.
It is a sequence of ...
, and the
Arikaree Formation
The Arikaree Formation, also Arikaree Group or Arikaree Sandstone is a geological unit in the central High Plains of the western United States. It preserves fossils dating to the late Oligocene to early Miocene
The Miocene ( ) is the first geo ...
.
Animals from the White River Badlands date from the
Eocene
The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene' ...
,
Oligocene
The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and 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 ...
, the
Miocene
The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...
, and the
Pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58[Epochs
In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era. The "epoch" serves as a reference point from which time is measured.
The moment of epoch is usually decided by ...](_blank)
.
List
Genera include:
See also
*
:White River Fauna
Further reading
* Rachel Benton, ''The White River Badlands: Geology and Paleontology'', Indiana University Press 2015
*
William Berryman Scott
William Berryman Scott (February 12, 1858 – March 29, 1947) was an American vertebrate paleontologist, authority on mammals, and principal author of the White River Oligocene monographs. He was a professor of geology and paleontology at P ...
, ''A history of land mammals in the western hemisphere'', MacMillan Publishing Company, 1913
References
Paleogene animals of North America
White River Formation, Fauna
White River Formation, Fauna
White River Formation, Fauna
White River Formation, Fauna
White River Formation, Fauna
White River Formation, Fauna
Paleontology lists
{{Paleogene-stub