Zatrachys
Zatrachys is an extinct genus of large and flat-headed zatracheid temnospondyl from the early Permian of North America.

Creator: Dmitry Bogdanov · CC BY 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
- ZatracheidaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Life habit
- amphibiousPBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Temnospondyli
- Environment
- brackish,freshwater,terrestrialPBDB, for Tetrapoda
Time the record covers
At least 15 million years on record.
The record covers at least 298.9 Mya to 283.3 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 303.7 Mya to 274.4 Mya.
23 occurrences of Zatrachys on record, most of them in the Permian. 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
23 occurrences- Carboniferous6%
- Permian94%
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
15 formations
- Arroyo Formation · Clear Fork Group3
- Abo/Cutler Formation3
- El Cobre Canyon Formation · Cutler Group2
- Cutler Formation2
- Greene Formation · Dunkard Group2
- Admiral Formation · Wichita Group1
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The named rock units Zatrachys 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.
Zatrachys and its relatives
PermianWhere Zatrachys and its relatives were recorded in the Permian.
Found in the same rock
143 taxa- Diadectes8 sites
- Eryops6 sites
- Sphenacodon ferox6 sites
- Eryops grandis5 sites
- Ophiacodon mirus5 sites
- Platyhystrix rugosus5 sites
- Chenoprosopus milleri4 sites
- Diadectes lentus4 sites
- Eryops megacephalus4 sites
- Trimerorhachis4 sites
- Xenacanthus4 sites
- Brachydectes newberryi3 sites
- Dimetrodon3 sites
- Dimetrodon natalis3 sites
- Diplocaulus3 sites
- Diplocaulus magnicornis3 sites
- Ophiacodon3 sites
- Ophiacodon retroversus3 sites
- Ophiacodon uniformis3 sites
- Archeria2 sites
- Archeria crassidisca2 sites
- Aspidosaurus2 sites
- Bolosaurus striatus2 sites
- Brachydectes2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 20 sites for Zatrachys, 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
11 references- Vertebrate faunal horizons in the Texas Permo-Carboniferous red beds5
- Morphology, Phylogeny, and Evolution of Diadectidae (Cotylosauria: Diadectomorpha)4
- First occurrence of the late Paleozoic amphibian Zatrachys serratus (Temnospondyli, Zatrachydidae) in the Eastern United States4
- Early Permian Vertebrate Assemblage and its Biostratigraphic Significance, Arroyo del Agua, Rio Arriba County, New Mexico3
- Handbook of Paleoherpetology Part 3A2 Temnospondyli I1
- Lower Permian vertebrate localities of New Mexico and their assemblages1
- Early Permian Depositional Environments of Pond Bonebeds in Central Archer County, Texas1
- Taphonomy of the Lower Permian Geraldine Bonebed in Archer County, Texas1
- Zatrachys serratus Cope (Amphibia; labyrinthodontia) from McClain County, Oklahoma1
- New or little known reptiles and amphibians from the Permian (?) of Texas1
- The Localities and Horizons of Permian Vertebrate Fossils in Texas1
Each of the 23 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 Zatrachys
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Creator: Dmitry Bogdanov
- Licence
- CC BY 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Zatrachys”
- 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 itZatracheidae through timeFormations of the PermianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Cope 1878