Megalagus

Megalagus

Yale Peabody Museum · CC0 · via GBIF. 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
PalaeolaginaePBDB
Diet
grazer, browserPBDB, for Leporidae
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Leporidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria

Time the record covers

At least 15 million years on record.

The record covers at least 33.9 Mya to 18.5 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 39.7 Mya to 16.3 Mya.

Eocene — about 34 of 95 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 58 of 95 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 3 of 95 occurrencesMiocene40–39 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences39–39 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences39–38 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences38–37 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences37–36 Mya — about 9 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 9 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 9 occurrences35–34 Mya — about 10 occurrences34–33 Mya — about 13 occurrences33–32 Mya — about 13 occurrences32–31 Mya — about 6 occurrences31–30 Mya — about 2 occurrences30–30 Mya — about 2 occurrences30–29 Mya — about 2 occurrences29–28 Mya — about 2 occurrences28–27 Mya — about 2 occurrences27–26 Mya — about 3 occurrences26–26 Mya — about 3 occurrences26–25 Mya — about 3 occurrences25–24 Mya — about 1 occurrence24–23 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences23–22 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences22–21 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences21–21 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences21–20 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences20–19 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences19–18 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences18–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–17 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences17–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences33.9 Mya18.5 Mya40.2 Mya15.8 Mya

95 occurrences of Megalagus on record, most of them in the Oligocene. 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

95 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

12 formations

Brule — 42.90°N, 105.20°WBrule — 40.80°N, 103.10°WBrule — 43.30°N, 102.50°WBrule — 42.80°N, 103.10°WBrule — 46.90°N, 102.80°WBrule — 43.20°N, 103.20°WBrule — 43.90°N, 102.40°WBrule — 42.40°N, 103.80°WChadron — 42.80°N, 103.40°WChadron — 42.40°N, 103.80°WChadron — 42.90°N, 105.20°WChadron — 45.47°N, 112.62°WChadron — 46.10°N, 103.30°WChadron — 43.30°N, 102.50°WSharps — 43.30°N, 102.50°WRenova — 45.00°N, 112.80°WRenova — 46.00°N, 112.00°WRenova — 45.90°N, 112.25°WRenova — 46.40°N, 112.80°WWhite River — 43.20°N, 108.20°WWhite River — 43.20°N, 107.10°WWhite River — 40.97°N, 106.22°WCypress Hills — 49.57°N, 109.88°WCypress Hills — 49.80°N, 109.00°WCypress Hills — 49.70°N, 109.00°WCypress Hills — 49.60°N, 108.80°WCypress Hills — 49.60°N, 109.00°WSage Creek — 45.00°N, 112.80°WArcadia — 27.90°N, 82.10°WDunbar Creek — 45.70°N, 111.00°WParachucla — 30.20°N, 82.80°WFlorissant — 38.93°N, 105.28°WBelgrade — 34.89°N, 77.23°W

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The named rock units Megalagus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 16 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Megalagus and its relatives

Oligocene

Where Megalagus and its relatives were recorded in the Oligocene.

Found in the same rock

692 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 94 sites for Megalagus, 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

40 references

Each of the 95 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. 28 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 Megalagus

Source
GBIF
Credit
Yale Peabody Museum
Licence
CC0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

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

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

Keep going

What may have been alongside itPalaeolaginae through timeFormations of the OligoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Walker 1931