Microchoerus erinaceus

via iDigBio · CC0 · via iDigBio. 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
- MicrochoerusPBDB
- Diet
- insectivorePBDB, for Omomyidae
- Life habit
- arborealPBDB, for Omomyidae
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Omomyidae
Time the record covers
At most 7.2 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 41.03 Mya and 33.9 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
18 occurrences of Microchoerus erinaceus on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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
18 occurrences- Eocene100%
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
- Perrière Formation2
- Headon Beds Formation2
- Upper Headon Beds Formation2
- Calcaire de Saint-Ouen Formation1
- Lower Headon Beds Formation1
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The named rock units Microchoerus erinaceus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 10 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Microchoerus erinaceus and its relatives
EoceneWhere Microchoerus erinaceus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.
Found in the same rock
306 taxa- Peratherium7 sites
- Glamys priscus6 sites
- Palaeotherium5 sites
- Hyaenodon minor4 sites
- Planorbis4 sites
- Saturninia gracilis4 sites
- Suevosciurus4 sites
- Adapis parisiensis3 sites
- Adelomys3 sites
- Amphiperatherium3 sites
- Amphiperatherium minutum3 sites
- Amphisbaenidae3 sites
- Anguini3 sites
- Anura3 sites
- Dichodon3 sites
- Elfomys parvulus3 sites
- Emys3 sites
- Limnaea3 sites
- Palaeopython cadurcensis3 sites
- Palaeotherium muehlbergi3 sites
- Peratherium cuvieri3 sites
- Plagiolophus annectens3 sites
- Pseudoloris parvulus3 sites
- Serpentes3 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 10 sites for Microchoerus erinaceus, 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
7 references- Les artiodactyles de l'Eocene moyen et superieur d'Europe occidentale; systematique et evolution6
- Nouvelles donnees sur les primates de l'Eocene superieur europeen5
- Marsupialia, Insectivora, Primates, Creodonta and Carnivora from the Headon Beds (upper Eocene) of southern England3
- First record of the genus Microchoerus (Omomyidae, Primates) in the western Iberian Peninsula and its palaeobiogeographic implications1
- Mesozoic and Tertiary Fossil Mammals and Birds of Great Britain1
- Nouvelles données sur le renouvellement des faunes de mammiferes a l'Eocene superieur, d'apres le gisement de Fons (Gard)1
- Record of the discovery of an Alligator with several new Mammalia in the Freshwater Strata at Hordwell1
Each of the 18 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. 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 Microchoerus erinaceus
- Source
- iDigBio
- Credit
- via iDigBio
- Licence
- CC0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Microchoerus erinaceus was found in Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itMicrochoerus through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Wood 1844