Enhydrocyon basilatus
Enhydrocyon is an extinct genus of bone crushing canid which inhabited North America during the Oligocene and Early Miocene, 30.8—20.4 Ma, existing for approximately 11 million years.

William Driller Matthew (1871-1930) · Public Domain · 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
- EnhydrocyonPBDB
- Diet
- carnivore, omnivorePBDB, for Canidae
- Life habit
- ground dwellingPBDB, for Canidae
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Time the record covers
At most 11 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 29.5 Mya and 18.5 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
3 occurrences of Enhydrocyon basilatus 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
3 occurrencesThese 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
1 formation
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The named rock units Enhydrocyon basilatus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 2 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Enhydrocyon basilatus and its relatives
MioceneWhere Enhydrocyon basilatus and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.
Found in the same rock
47 taxa- Capacikala gradatus2 sites
- Promerycochoerus superbus2 sites
- Agriochoerus guyotianus1 site
- Allomys nitens1 site
- Archaeolagus1 site
- Archaeotherium1 site
- Canis geismarianus1 site
- Daeodon humerosus1 site
- Daeodon shoshonensis1 site
- Daphoenus1 site
- Daphoenus hartshornianus1 site
- Desmatochoerus hatcheri1 site
- Diceratherium annectens1 site
- Diceratherium armatum1 site
- Enhydrocyon stenocephalus1 site
- Entoptychus cavifrons1 site
- Entoptychus crassiramis1 site
- Entoptychus planifrons1 site
- Eporeodon occidentalis1 site
- Gentilicamelus sternbergi1 site
- Hesperocyon gregarius1 site
- Hoplophoneus strigidens1 site
- Hypertragulus calcaratus1 site
- Hypsiops latidens1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 3 sites for Enhydrocyon basilatus, 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
2 references- Phylogenetic systematics of the Hesperocyoninae (Carnivora: Canidae)2
- Observations on the faunae of the Miocene Tertiaries of Oregon1
Each of the 3 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 the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Enhydrocyon basilatus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- William Driller Matthew (1871-1930)
- Licence
- Public Domain
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Enhydrocyon basilatus was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Enhydrocyon”
- 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 itEnhydrocyon through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Cope 1879)