Tachybaptus ruficollis
The little grebe, also known as the dabchick, is a member of the grebe family of water birds. The genus name is from Ancient Greek takhus "fast" and bapto "to sink under". The specific ruficollis is from Latin rufus "red" and Modern Latin -collis, "-necked", itself derived from Latin collum "neck".

Andreas Trepte · CC BY-SA 2.5 · 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- Also called
- little grebePBDB
- Sits inside
- TachybaptusPBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Coelurosauria
- Life habit
- ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda
- Mass
- 13.7 gWikidata
Time the record covers
At most 1.8 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 1.8 Mya and 11.7 ka, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
3 occurrences of Tachybaptus ruficollis on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. 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
3 occurrences- Pleistocene100%
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.
Tachybaptus ruficollis and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Tachybaptus ruficollis and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
80 taxa- Anas3 sites
- Anas platyrhynchos2 sites
- Anatidae2 sites
- Aythya2 sites
- Aythya nyroca2 sites
- Corvidae2 sites
- Crex crex2 sites
- Fulica atra2 sites
- Netta rufina2 sites
- Numenius2 sites
- Tadorna2 sites
- Accipiter1 site
- Accipitridae1 site
- Allohippus stenonis1 site
- Anas crecca1 site
- Anser1 site
- Anser albifrons1 site
- Anser anser1 site
- Apodemus1 site
- Aquila1 site
- Aquila chrysaetos1 site
- Ardea1 site
- Ardeidae1 site
- Ardeola1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 3 sites for Tachybaptus ruficollis, 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
3 references- Exploitation of a seasonal resource: bird hunting during the late Natufian at Shubayqa 11
- The fossil bird associations from the early Middle Pleistocene of the Ragusa province (SE Sicily, Italy)1
- Huescar-1 (Granada, Espana): Avance de la lista de aves y consiguientes conjeturas sobre paleoambiente y paleogeografia1
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. 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 Tachybaptus ruficollis
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Andreas Trepte
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 2.5
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Licence
- In Copyright
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Tachybaptus ruficollis · UMZC:Vertebrates:208.BA
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
- 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 itTachybaptus through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Pallas 1764)