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Huge flying squirrels that were as huge as home felines slid throughout North America around 5 million years back, scientists have actually found, after determining an uncommon fossil discovered inside an ancient sinkhole.
Scientist determined the flying squirrel fossil amongst a cache of animal stays that were discovered in Tennessee 25 years earlier. The specimen comes from an extinct genus called Miopetauristawhich are more frequently discovered in Asia, though there are 2 supposed examples from Florida, according to a research study released Feb. 21 in the Journal of Mammalian Evolution
“It is amazing to imagine these giant flying squirrels gliding over rhinos and mastodons living in the forests of Tennessee 5 million years ago,” research study co-author Joshua Samuelsan associate teacher of geosciences at East Tennessee State University, stated in a declaration
The group thinks that Miopetaurista moved into North America when the continent was linked to Asia by means of the Bering Land Bridge in the early Pliocene (5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago). Miopetaurista would have discovered warm forests in what is now Tennessee that resembled those in Asia at the time, according to the research study.
This Miopetaurista specimen was determined from a single tooth discovered at the Gray Fossil Site in East Tennessee. Other fossils from this website expose that the area was teaming with uncommon wildlife when Miopetaurista lived.
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Scientists are still finding out about the history of flying squirrels, which have a spotty fossil record. The earliest North American examples go back to around 36 million years back. Flying squirrels disappeared from the fossil record around 9 million years earlier, before apparently coming back with Miopetaurista in Florida around 4 million years earlier, according to the research study.
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The Gray Fossil Site depends on a million years older than the 2 fossils discovered in Florida, so the current discovery is possibly the earliest Miopetaurista fossil ever found in North America to date.
The Gray Fossil Site sinkhole formed and filled with water around 5 million years back. Surrounded by a forest, the resulting pond offered a drinking source for numerous ancient types. Sediment and mud then gradually filled the pond, burying and protecting animals that passed away at the website, according to East Tennessee State University
Miopetaurista weighed around 3.3 pounds (1.5 kgs), much heavier than the flying squirrels occupying Tennessee today. Tennessee’s northern flying squirrel (Glaucomys sabrinusweighs as much as simply 2.5 ounces (71 grams), according to the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency
Miopetaurista prospered in what is now Tennessee till its warm environments started cooling at the start of the Pleistocene around 2.6 million years back. The Pleistocene brought glacial epoch, most likely requiring Miopetaurista south to warmer areas such as Florida, according to the scientists.
“As the environment cooled with time, the Pleistocene Ice Ages resulted in the seclusion of these huge flying squirrels in warmer sanctuaries like Florida, and eventually added to their termination,” research study co-author Montserrat Grau-Camatsa scientist at the Catalan Institute of Paleontology in Spain, stated in the declaration.
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