Andrias matthewi

Andrias matthewi, or Matthew's giant salamander, is an extinct species of giant salamander from the Miocene of North America. It belongs to the genus Andrias, which contains the living Asian giant salamanders. It is the largest salamander known to have ever existed, with a maximum estimated length of 2.3 m. Its fossils have been found in Nebraska, Colorado, and Saskatchewan.

Andrias matthewi

Armin Reindl · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
AndriasPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Temnospondyli
Life habit
amphibiousPBDB, for Temnospondyli
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Temnospondyli
Environment
brackish,freshwater,terrestrialPBDB, for Tetrapoda

Time the record covers

At most 6 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 18.5 Mya and 12.5 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Miocene — about 6 of 6 occurrencesMiocene19–18 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences18–18 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences18–18 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences18–18 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences18–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–16 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences15–14 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences14–13 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences13–12 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences19 Mya12 Mya

6 occurrences of Andrias matthewi on record, most of them in the Miocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

6 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

5 formations

Runningwater — 42.80°N, 103.10°WRunningwater — 42.07°N, 103.08°WValentine — 42.78°N, 100.03°WPawnee Creek — 40.90°N, 103.28°WSnake Creek — 42.40°N, 103.80°WWood Mountain — 49.18°N, 105.95°W

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The named rock units Andrias matthewi has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Andrias matthewi and its relatives

Miocene

Where Andrias matthewi and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.

Found in the same rock

185 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Andrias matthewi, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

3 references

Each of the 6 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Andrias matthewi

Credit
Armin Reindl
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itAndrias through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Cook 1917)