Pastinachus

Pastinachus is a genus of stingrays in the family Dasyatidae. This genus was long held to be monotypic, containing only the cowtail stingray. Recent studies of Indo-Pacific stingrays have revealed that there are in fact a number of different species of Pastinachus, and that some former junior synonyms may need to be resurrected.

Pastinachus

Julien Willem · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
HypolophinaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Myliobatiformes
Life habit
nektobenthicPBDB, for Myliobatiformes
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Myliobatiformes

Time the record covers

At least 71 million years on record.

The record covers at least 83.6 Mya to 11.63 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 85.7 Mya to 5.333 Mya.

Late Cretaceous — about 2 of 17 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 17 occurrencesEocene — about 12 of 17 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 1 of 17 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 2 of 17 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 0 of 17 occurrences87–85 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences85–82 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences82–79 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences79–76 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences76–73 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences73–71 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences43–40 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences40–37 Mya — about 2 occurrences37–34 Mya — about 8 occurrences34–32 Mya — about 1 occurrence29–26 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences26–23 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences23–20 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences20–18 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences18–15 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences12–9.3 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences9.3–6.5 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences6.5–3.7 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences83.6 Mya11.63 Mya87 Mya4 Mya

17 occurrences of Pastinachus on record, most of them in the Eocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. 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

17 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

8 formations

Qasr el-Sagha — 29.32°N, 30.05°EQasr el-Sagha — 29.27°N, 30.01°EEutaw — 32.75°N, 87.73°WBirket Qarun — 29.27°N, 30.01°EQasr El Sagha — 28.82°N, 29.14°ETar Heel — 34.57°N, 78.50°WMalembo — 5.34°S, 12.18°ESeria — 4.81°N, 114.67°EMaradah — 28.58°N, 19.90°E

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The named rock units Pastinachus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Pastinachus and its relatives

Eocene

Where Pastinachus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

170 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 7 sites for Pastinachus, 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

8 references

Each of the 17 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 content2

Picture of Pastinachus

Credit
Julien Willem
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were 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 itHypolophinae through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Rüppell 1828