Cretaceous fish ID

[Jose Montemayor]

I would like some help to identify this fish. The position and preservation make it a little bit hard to identify.

It was found in Vallecillo, Northeastern Mexico.

The full  length is 128 cms. Teeth length is approximately 2 cms.

I'll post several photos in comments.

[Jose Montemayor]

[Jose Montemayor]

[Jose Montemayor]

[Jose Montemayor]

[Jose Montemayor]

[facehugger]

The vertebrae remind me very much of a Xiphactinus species.

 

This is an amateur guess, however. Others with more experience will chime in soon.  

[piranha]

Here is the top specialist of Cretaceous fishes of Mexico:

 

Jesús Alvarado Ortega

LINK 1

LINK 2

[Fossildude19]

@Ramo  @Ptychodus04  @KansasFossilHunter  @oilshale @Uncle Siphuncle @Xiphactinus

[Xiphactinus]

Pretty sure that’s a Pachyrhizodus. 

[Heteromorph]

Fascinating. Perhaps this and this paper could be of some help. The first is on the plattenkalk of Vallecillo, and the second is a description of the fauna found at the El Rosario quarry, not too far away.

[Ptychodus04]

14 minutes ago, Xiphactinus said:

Pretty sure that’s a Pachyrhizodus. 

+1. Looks like a P. caninus (or something very similar) based on the teeth, jaw structure (and size), and vertebrae.

[Jose Montemayor]

17 hours ago, Ptychodus04 said:

+1. Looks like a P. caninus (or something very similar) based on the teeth, jaw structure (and size), and vertebrae.

Thanks a lot for your observations. I´ll look up information about that species. 

[RJB]

  Lots of repair on that rock but still a really cool fossil fish!!!   Who cant love those teeth! 

 

RB

[Jose Montemayor]

4 hours ago, RJB said:

  Lots of repair on that rock but still a really cool fossil fish!!!   Who cant love those teeth! 

 

RB

Yeap  unfortunately it was found broken into a lot of pieces and it got really hard to glue them up. Actually, the tail wasn’t even found attached to the body, it was like 20 cms apart.