Elopidae

The Elopidae are an ancient family of ray-finned fish, one of two living members of the order Elopiformes. They containing a single living genus, Elops, and many extinct genera dating back to the Late Jurassic, when the earliest stem-group elopids are known. They appear to have diverged from their closest relatives, the Megalopidae, during the Jurassic.

Elopidae

Clinton & Charles Robertson from Del Rio, Texas & College Station, TX, USA · CC BY 2.0 · 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
ElopiformesPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Elopiformes
Life habit
nektonicPBDB, for Elopiformes
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Elopiformes

Time the record covers

At least 149 million years on record.

The record covers at least 149.2 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 152.21 Mya to 0 Mya.

Late Jurassic — about 8 of 85 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous — about 26 of 85 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 35 of 85 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 85 occurrencesEocene — about 10 of 85 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 1 of 85 occurrencesMiocene — about 0 of 85 occurrencesPliocene — about 1 of 85 occurrencesPleistocene — about 3 of 85 occurrences155–150 Mya — about 4 occurrences150–145 Mya — about 4 occurrences145–140 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences135–129 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences129–124 Mya — about 2 occurrences124–119 Mya — about 5 occurrences119–114 Mya — about 12 occurrences114–109 Mya — about 4 occurrences109–104 Mya — about 2 occurrences104–98 Mya — about 3 occurrences98–93 Mya — about 5 occurrences93–88 Mya — about 2 occurrences88–83 Mya — about 5 occurrences83–78 Mya — about 6 occurrences78–72 Mya — about 6 occurrences72–67 Mya — about 7 occurrences67–62 Mya — about 2 occurrences57–52 Mya — about 3 occurrences52–47 Mya — about 4 occurrences47–41 Mya — about 3 occurrences41–36 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences36–31 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences31–26 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences10–5.2 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences5.2–0 Mya — about 5 occurrences149.2 Mya11.7 ka155 Mya0 Mya

85 occurrences of Elopidae on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. 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

85 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

33 formations

Romualdo — 7.52°S, 39.57°WRomualdo — 7.51°S, 39.55°WRomualdo — 7.47°S, 39.76°WRomualdo — 7.43°S, 39.82°WRomualdo — 7.22°S, 39.27°WLance — 43.12°N, 104.64°WLance — 43.18°N, 104.53°WLance — 43.13°N, 104.49°WLance — 43.15°N, 104.57°WLondon Clay — 51.40°N, 0.83°EDinosaur Park — 49.12°N, 110.47°WDinosaur Park — 50.68°N, 108.09°WMooreville Chalk — 33.12°N, 88.26°WMooreville Chalk — 32.95°N, 88.08°WMooreville Chalk — 32.76°N, 88.02°WMancos Shale — 40.76°N, 108.89°WLa Pedrera de Rúbies — 42.02°N, 0.89°ELa Pedrera de Rúbies — 42.03°N, 0.83°EAhlen — 51.83°N, 7.83°EStarigrad Limestone — 43.19°N, 16.65°EHell Creek — 47.80°N, 106.10°WHell Creek — 45.50°N, 103.10°WFort Crittenden — 31.69°N, 110.81°WPainten — 48.92°N, 11.58°ETlayúa — 18.59°N, 97.90°WMiretrain Marl — 43.57°N, 1.11°WFox Hills — 46.42°N, 100.74°WFox Hills — 46.26°N, 100.55°WHolleywell, New Pit, Lewes — 51.30°N, 0.39°EBermont — 27.70°N, 82.50°WWahweap — 37.59°N, 112.90°WSpeeton Clay — 54.16°N, 0.24°WBearpaw Shale — 49.68°N, 112.83°WSannine — 34.06°N, 35.69°ETorleite — 50.04°N, 11.12°ETurga — 50.83°N, 116.19°ELiegende Bankkalk — 48.12°N, 8.87°E

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The named rock units Elopidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 9 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 11 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Elopidae and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Elopidae and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

1,816 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 67 sites for Elopidae, 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

48 references

Each of the 85 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. 36 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Elopidae

Credit
Clinton & Charles Robertson from Del Rio, Texas & College Station, TX, USA
Licence
CC BY 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Elopidae was found in Smithsonian Open Access and Sketchfab.

MorphoSource was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

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 itElopiformes through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Bonaparte 1846