My Angustidens And Whale/porpoise Teeth

[Taffie]

Thought I'd share a little of my finds from the summer. Feel free to correct any incorrect labeling.

Edited October 28, 2011 by Taffie

[MikeDOTB]

Hey I love the assortment of whale/dolphin teeth. Just one question though for those, top row, middle. What kind of tooth is that? Its pretty cool looking! I know the ones around it are squalodon, but that middle one is definitely interesting.

And in the Angy pic, the little tooth right above the big one, and below the posterior, is that tooth serrated?

[Fossildude19]

Awesome!

Some of those whale teeth are extra-cool! B)

Thanks for sharing these with us!

Regards,

[Auspex]

Hey I love the assortment of whale/dolphin teeth....top row, middle. What kind of tooth is that?

Gotta' be a Squalodon too...which I like very much

[Al Dente]

I think the interesting looking dolphin tooth in the middle belongs to the genus Tretosphys. Similar looking teeth are found in the Calvert Formation and in the Pungo River Formation.

[Taffie]

Hey I love the assortment of whale/dolphin teeth. Just one question though for those, top row, middle. What kind of tooth is that? Its pretty cool looking! I know the ones around it are squalodon, but that middle one is definitely interesting.

And in the Angy pic, the little tooth right above the big one, and below the posterior, is that tooth serrated?

No that tooth is not serrated. Do you have some ideas?

[Auspex]

I think the interesting looking dolphin tooth in the middle belongs to the genus Tretosphys. Similar looking teeth are found in the Calvert Formation and in the Pungo River Formation.

This one is from a dolphin?

Wow, that's cool!

[Taffie]

Awesome!

Some of those whale teeth are extra-cool! B)

Thanks for sharing these with us!

Regards,

My pleasure!

[Taffie]

This one is from a dolphin?

Wow, that's cool!

I identified it from this picture on Blackriver Fossils. They id it as squalodon atlanticus. What do you think?

[Al Dente]

I identified it from this picture on Blackriver Fossils. They id it as squalodon atlanticus. What do you think?

I think the tooth on the Black River fossil page is the same as yours, but I don't think either are squalodon. Squalodon molars are double rooted. Here's a picture of a similar tooth from this web site:http://www.fossiel.n...hp?TopicID=8629

[Taffie]

I think the tooth on the Black River fossil page is the same as yours, but I don't think either are squalodon. Squalodon molars are double rooted. Here's a picture of a similar tooth from this web site:http://www.fossiel.n...hp?TopicID=8629

So if my translator was working right, they are saying it's a dolphin tooth?

[Boesse]

Hey Folks,

With regards to the peculiar multicuspate cetacean tooth - yes, it is awesome, that's for sure. And it is definitely some sort of a basal odontocete. Is it Tretosphys? I doubt it. The teeth of Tretosphys are jagged looking, but they don't have as many cusps as these. Reviewing the known teeth of Tretosphys - and there are not many - they appear to have smoother enamel, and fewer leave-like cusps, a more conical crown, and a crown that is posteriorly hooked at that (presumed premolars of Tretopsphys anyway; the anterior teeth - incisors and canines - have conical non-hooked crowns, but lack extra cusps).

Secondly, Tretosphys is Middle Miocene. I'm assuming because you're in South Carolina that these are Chandler Bridge or Ashley Fm. specimens, and most marine mammal fossils from that area are late Oligocene. We're talking about a 10 million year difference in age. These finely sculptured teeth do appear to be diagnostic, and I'm sure that they are the minority among odontocetes - i.e. that they are probably diagnostic for whatever taxon they belong to. However, they most likely belong to something that hasn't been described yet, as very little of the Oligocene odontocete assemblage from South Carolina has been described. It also doesn't appear to belong to previously described taxa from the late Oligocene (e.g. Simocetus, certain squalodontids, Xenorophus, Agorophius).

Although tempting - it is really difficult to positively identify isolated odontocete teeth. Teeth of toothed whales have been found time and again to be diagnostic at the family level (whatever a family is), not really even at the species level. For example, some of those other teeth look like Squalodon teeth - but it's unclear if true bona fide Squalodon was swimming around in the Oligocene, as true Squalodon material is strictly Miocene in age (there are a few Oligocene records, but they are often fragmentary, or have historically been placed in other genera).

Nice material!

Bobby

[Al Dente]

Reviewing the known teeth of Tretosphys - and there are not many - they appear to have smoother enamel, and fewer leave-like cusps, a more conical crown, and a crown that is posteriorly hooked at that (presumed premolars of Tretopsphys anyway; the anterior teeth - incisors and canines - have conical non-hooked crowns, but lack extra cusps).

A few teeth I've seen from Lee Creek (Pungo River) that look almost identical to this South Carolina tooth. I looked through the trip reports on Elasmo.com and found this tooth that looks very similar to the South Carolina tooth. It is on the May 24, 2009 trip report and was identified as Tretosphys (tooth C in the image). I don't know who or how it was identified and I'm open to the idea it was misidentified.

[Al Dente]

I was able to locate my copy of Kellogg's 1955 paper where he describes Tretosphys gabbii. Bobby is correct when he says Taffie's tooth is probably not Tretosphys. Here one of the plates from Kellogg's paper:

Kellogg, 1955, Three Miocene Porpoises from the Calvert Cliffs, Maryland.

[Taffie]

I am amazed that this tooth is so hard to id. I think my sister found one also. I will check with her and get a photo of it. Thanks for trying to solve this .

[tracer]

this is a high-quality topic that sort of has it all, from first-rate pictures to extremely informed posts, and it deals with a subject that represents the desire many have to fully understand and place their finds in the proper perspective. i really like this sort of thing and feel that it epitomizes what makes the forum of great value.

[MikeDOTB]

I couldnt agree more with Tracer. I have seen many dolphin teeth with one or two "conical cusps" but never that many, which had me surprised at the tooth. Its a very interesting find and I am glad this topic has received so much attention. I was thinking I have seen those in Aurora as well, as thats where all my dolphin material comes from.

Taffie, have you possibly hunted any younger formations than Oligicene where this tooth may have been picked up, or was it strictly Oligicene in your area?

[Taffie]

I couldnt agree more with Tracer. I have seen many dolphin teeth with one or two "conical cusps" but never that many, which had me surprised at the tooth. Its a very interesting find and I am glad this topic has received so much attention. I was thinking I have seen those in Aurora as well, as thats where all my dolphin material comes from.

Taffie, have you possibly hunted any younger formations than Oligicene where this tooth may have been picked up, or was it strictly Oligicene in your area?

CBK was kind enough to send me this information about my area:

The ditches in Summerville area are mainly Oligocene and Miocene as well. But, again, the material is reworked in a stream environment. I know that there are collectors in Summerville that can tell you the age of the formation or layer just by looking at the composition of the sediment. The most prominent ages represented in the lowcountry are Eocene (though usually very deep/scarce unless reworked), Oligocene (represented by the thick Chandler Bridge formation - noted for C. angustiden), Miocene (introduction of C. megalodon, I. hastalis), Pliocene (smaller species abundant, like dusky, bull, hammerhead, etc.), and Pleistocene (ice age megafauna - like mastodon, mammoth, giant ground sloth, etc.)

I'm sorry for my ignorance, hope this answers your question. A ditch in Summerville is where I found the tooth.

[siteseer]

When I started collecting fossils, one of the first specimens I was hoping to find or acquire was some kind of early whale tooth. One of the first ones in my collection was a small but well-preserved tooth labelled as "Zeuglodon" from the Chandler Bridge Formation. Not long after that, I learned that the tooth was too small and too young to be a Zeuglodon as that whale lived only during the mid-late Eocene while the Chandler Bridge Formation is Late Oligocene in age. Well, I still wanted to know which whale it was and showed it to various collectors with the consensus being that it was "squalodont." That doesn't necessarily mean that it came from a species of the genus Squalodon, but instead it is more of a general name for the tooth form. It could be an early relative of Squalodon or closer to an early relative of modern toothed whales. It had seemed to me as well that a well-preserved tooth should be identifiable but isolated teeth are not always diagnostic of a species or genus. This is particularly true of many whales across geologic time.

You can find similar threads about Miocene and Pliocene whale tooth forms being unidentifiable to genus or species as well. Here is one:

http://www.thefossil...__1#entry183509

Jess

I am amazed that this tooth is so hard to id. I think my sister found one also. I will check with her and get a photo of it. Thanks for trying to solve this .

Edited November 2, 2011 by siteseer

[Boesse]

Alrightey, so in October 2011 I had no idea I'd be on the east coast in ten years (I had a feeling I'd likely end up east of the Mississippi, just because there's more jobs back east), but I get to revisit this 10 years later as a smarter scientist. I often read stuff I wrote years ago and think "I was so stupid then what the h___" [generally over relatively minor issues but the gist is still good]. But I digress...

 

Now that I've spent six years on the east coast looking at the Oligocene whale and dolphin assemblage from Charleston, which has probably the widest variety of heterodont dolphin teeth you could ever imagine to find in one location, I'm much better suited to answering the question. In 2018, a friend of the museum collected and donated, on behalf of the property owner, a fragmentary skeleton of a very early relative of Xiphiacetus - the eurhinodelphinid dolphin that is so common at Calvert Cliffs. I'm not going to share pictures of the specimen, since it is still unnamed and still under study, but I can tell you it is probably a eurhinodelphinid, and has a very high tooth count (perhaps 40-60 teeth per quadrant) and is long-snouted; all of the teeth are single rooted, and the tooth shape changes from front to back - with more typical dolphin-like conical teeth up front, and these multicuspate "molars" towards the back. It basically indicates that homodonty evolved long after polydonty, and surprisingly, long after all the teeth became single-rooted.

[Scylla]

Ok, so in nine more years we will get the answer?

[Boesse]

You've got the answer, we just need to name the dolphin!

[Dan the digger]

I think ,it like the one in my picture i posted ,is a type of  "Phoca debilis"/"Phoca modesta" morphotype,as our resident Paleontologist pointed out to me ,look up 'phoca modesta"