An assessment of the Cenozoic avifauna of Switzerland, with a description of two fossil owls (Aves, Strigiformes)
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An assessment of the Cenozoic avifauna of Switzerland, with a description of two fossil owls (Aves, Strigiformes) V. L. De Pietri • C. Mourer-Chauvire´ • U. Menkveld-Gfeller C. A. Meyer • L. Costeur
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Received: 14 December 2012 / Accepted: 26 March 2013 / Published online: 16 November 2013 Swiss Geological Society 2013
Abstract The fossil skeletal record of birds from the Cenozoic of Switzerland is rather poor, despite the fact that avian tracks have been described from twenty tracksites. We review the Swiss fossil skeletal avifauna with emphasis put on new material discovered in the collection of the Natural History Museum Basel. This material includes two new owls (Strigiformes), one from a Late Eocene fissure filling from the Go¨sgen canal, and another from the Late Oligocene of Mu¨mliswil. The Eocene owl specimen consists of a partial, distal tarsometatarsus, and is therefore too incompletely preserved to allow for reliable hypotheses concerning its taxonomic affinities. It does, however, display features resembling members of the extinct family Palaeoglaucidae. The Oligocene specimen is tentatively attributed to the genus Oligostrix, and it is the youngest representative of the extinct family Protostrigidae. Based on the first complete tarsometatarsus for this family, we
Editorial Handling: L. Cavin & D. Marty.
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00015-013-0127-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. V. L. De Pietri (&) C. A. Meyer L. Costeur Naturhistorisches Museum Basel, Augustinergasse 2, 4001 Basel, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected] C. Mourer-Chauvire´ Laboratoire de Ge´ologie de Lyon: Terre, Plane`tes et Environnement, CNRS UMR 5276, Universite´ Lyon 1, 2 rue Dubois, 69622 Villeurbanne Cedex, France U. Menkveld-Gfeller Naturhistorisches Museum der Burgergemeinde Bern, Bernastrasse 15, 3005 Bern, Switzerland
erect a new species, ?Oligostrix bergeri. These two specimens represent the first record of fossil owls from Switzerland. Keywords Fossil birds Protostrigidae Avian tracks Vertebrate ichnology Swiss Molasse Oligostrix bergeri sp. nov. Eocene Oligocene Abbreviations NMB Naturhistorisches Museum Basel PIMUZ Pala¨ontologisches Institut und Museum der Universita¨t Zu¨rich MN Mammal Neogene MP Mammal Palaeogene
1 Introduction Cenozoic fossil birds from the Swiss Molasse were first mentioned by von Meyer (1839a, b). The first specimen, from the Early Oligocene of Engi (Matt Formation) in the Canton of Glarus, was described as Protornis glarniensis (von Meyer 1844, 1856) and sparked international interest, as during the first half of the nineteenth century mentions or publications concerning fossil birds were still extremely rare (Furrer and Leu 1998). The most recent review of the fossil avifauna of Switzerland was undertaken by Mlı´kovsky´ (1996), but significant finds of fossil bird bones were limited to only a couple of localities (i.e. Egerkingen and Engi). As detailed in Mlı´kovsky´ (1996
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