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A Fossil Species of Eremophila and Other Larks (Aves, Alaudidae) from the upper Pliocene of the Selenga River Valley (Central Asia)

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Abstract

We describe lark (Alaudidae) fossils from the upper Pliocene of the Beregovaya (southern Transbaikalia) and Shaamar (northern Mongolia) localities. The presence of 4 extinct forms in these localities is established, including the new fossil horned lark Eremophila orkhonensis (Zelenkov et Kurochkin, 2012), comb. nov. This is the oldest member of Eremophila in the fossil record, indicating a possible Central Asian origin of the genus. Two other larks Alaudala aff. A. rufescens and Calandrella aff. C. brachydactyla also probably represent extinct forms. The paper describes in detail the osteology of larks and compares it with other passerines in its size class. The evolutionary history of Eremophila is discussed, and the environmental preferences of larks and their relationship to the late Pliocene landscapes of Central Asia are considered.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors thank M.A. Erbayeva and V.S. Zazhigin for collecting the fossil material and making it available to us; A.B. Savinetsky for giving access to the osteological collection of the Historical Ecology Laboratory at the IPEE RAS, N.V. Volkova for providing photographs of the skeletons of Alaudidae, and the reviewers A.B. Savinetsky and A.V. Panteleev for valuable comments.

Funding

This work was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research, project no. 18-34-00680.

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  1. Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, 117647, Moscow, Russia

    E. S. Palastrova & N. V. Zelenkov

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  1. E. S. Palastrova
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  2. N. V. Zelenkov
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Correspondence to E. S. Palastrova or N. V. Zelenkov.

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Translated by D. Ponomarenko

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Palastrova, E.S., Zelenkov, N.V. A Fossil Species of Eremophila and Other Larks (Aves, Alaudidae) from the upper Pliocene of the Selenga River Valley (Central Asia). Paleontol. J. 54, 187–204 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0031030120020124

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