North-Central Section - 54th Annual Meeting - 2020

Paper No. 30-3
Presentation Time: 8:30 AM-5:30 PM

ADDITIONAL VERTEBRATES FROM THE WREFORD LIMESTONE (PERMIAN: CISURALIAN, SAKMARIAN) OF SOUTHERN KANSAS


SHELL, Ryan, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Wright State University, Dayton, OH 45324, PETERMAN, David J., Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Wright State University, 3640 Colonel Glenn Hwy, Dayton, OH 45435 and CIAMPAGLIO, Charles N., Department of Earth and Environmental Science, Wright State University - Lake Campus, 7600 Lake Campus Drive, Celina, OH 45885

The Cisuralian Epoch of the Permian Period contains relatively few marine vertebrate faunas. Currently (as of spring 2020) the total number of published marine faunas from this time with 4 species or more present number less than 10 globally. Outcrops of the Wreford Formation, near Arkansas City, Kansas. Have been known to produce microremains of an unknown elasmobranch and the petalodontiform genus Jansassa. In this study, we return to this locality and recover 8 additional taxa of marine vertebrate: Glickmanius, Cooleyella, Cobelodus, and Denaea, as well as unidentifiable members of the Paleonisciformes, Platysomidae, Acanthodii, and Lonchidiidae. This effectively increases the alpha diversity at this locality by a factor 5, and helps to illustrate this Cisuarlian ecosystem as one rich in chondrichthyans, with multiple niches available to predatory, filter feeding, and durophagous vertebrates.