Eocene Pengiun humerus

[Wynand]

This one had me stumped for a while, until I saw a full penguin humerus bone on display at a museum.

 

The humeral arterial sulcus being very evident!

 

This one is broken in halve, which would have made it about 12cm in total length.

 

Due to location and size, believing that this is Palaeudyptes Gunnari from Eocene period (56 to 33.9 million years ago)

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

Very nice.

And very interesting post on penguins!  

[fossil_sea_urchin]

Awesome, you don't see many of them around.

[ynot]

Nice find.

@Auspex will like this.

[Auspex]

GIMME!

As far as I know (and my knowledge base is dated), the oldest penguin fossil found in Africa is Miocene. This would be a very important find!

[6ix]

Very nice, and a great identification!

Pinging Al into this..

@Waimanu 1

[Bobby Rico]

Wow that’s incredible and a great thread, looking forward to reading more about this. 

[Wynand]

On ‎08‎/‎02‎/‎2019 at 10:33 PM, Auspex said:

GIMME!

As far as I know (and my knowledge base is dated), the oldest penguin fossil found in Africa is Miocene. This would be a very important find!

Thanks. I could be wrong on the Eocene part, but it was where the available info led me.

Did some further reading and the oldest African penguin fossil is indeed dated as Miocene.

[Boesse]

Very unlikely to be Palaeeudyptes. However, most fossil penguins from south Africa have not yet really been identified to the genus level. I would do some detective work and try and figure out a likely geological 'source' for the specimen using geologic maps of the area. It is possible that this specimen may be worth study if it enters a permanent museum collection, and I might recommend contacting noted paleo-penguinologists Dr. Daniel Ksepka (Bruce Museum) and Dr. Daniel Thomas (Massey U., Nz).