Protosphyraena

Protosphyraena; Temporal range: Late Cretaceous, Coniacian–Maastrichtian PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
	Skull and pectoral fin fossils of Protosphyraena
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Pachycormiformes
Family:	Pachycormidae
Genus:	Protosphyraena; Leidy, 1857
Species
	Protosphyraena perniciosa; Protosphyraena bentoniana; Protosphyraena nitida;

Protosphyraena is a fossil

Pachycormidae

.

History and taxonomy

As is the case with many

paleontologist, Joseph Leidy, based on Mantell's English finds. Earlier, Leidy had published an illustration of a Protosphyraena tooth from the Cretaceous-aged Navesink Formation of New Jersey (Maastrichtian), but mistakenly identified it as having come from a dinosaur. During the 1870s, B. F. Mudge, a fossil collector supplying material to rival paleontologists Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh, discovered a number of specimens of Protosphyraena in Niobrara exposures in Rooks and Ellis counties in Kansas and sent them back east. Between 1873 and 1877, Cope renamed three species based on Mudge's specimens, all of which would eventually be recognized as belonging to the genus Protosphyraena: Erisichte nitida, "Portheus" gladius, and "Pelecopterus" pernicciosus. Between 1895 and 1903, paleontologists in America and England, including Arthur Smith Woodward

(1895), Loomis (1900), O. P. Hay (1903), in a series of important works, reviewed the genus, adding much to our understanding of this fish.

Today, two species of Protosphyraena are recognized from the Niobrara Chalk of the western United States: P. nitida and P. perniciosa. An additional species, P. bentonianum was named by Albin Stewart in 1898, based on a specimen from the older Lincoln Member of the Greenhorn Limestone (Upper Cenomanian). Perhaps the oldest remains of Protosphyraena in North America have come from the upper beds of the Dakota Sandstone (middle Cenomanian) in Russell County, Kansas (Everhart, 2005; p. 91).

Anatomy

Two species of Kansas *Protosphyraena* - the larger (about 3 m long) *P. perniciosa* and smaller *P. nitida*

In its general body plan, Protosphyraena resembled a modern

ossified than that of most bony fishes and tended to be torn apart by scavengers or decay before burial and fossilization (Everhart, 2005; p. 93). Like most of the Cretaceous marine fauna, Protosphyraena became extinct at the end of the Mesozoic; the resemblance to living swordfish apparently results from convergent evolution

.

Gallery

Skull fossil
Holotype rostrum of Protosphyraena nitida (from Hay, 1903)
Holotype of Protosphyraena nitida (from Hay, 1903); portions of dentary, splenial, pectoral fin
Pectoral girdle of Protosphyraena perniciosa and other fossils

References

Cope, E. D. (1873). "[On an extinct genus of saurodont fishes]". Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. 24: 280–281.
Cope, E. D. 1873. On two new species of Saurodontidae. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 25:337-339.
Cope, E. D. 1874. Review of the vertebrata of the Cretaceous period found west of the Mississippi River. U. S. Geolological Survey of the Territories, Bulletin 1(2):3-48.
Cope, E. D. 1875. The Vertebrata of the Cretaceous Formations of the West. Report of the U. S. Geological Survey of the Territories. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office):302 pp.
Everhart, M. J. 2005. Oceans of Kansas: A Natural History of the Western Interior Sea. Indiana University Press: 323 pp.
Hay, O. P. (1903). "On certain genera and species of North American Cretaceous Actinopterous Fishes". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. 19: 1–95.
Leidy, J. (1857). "Remarks on Saurocephalus and its allies". Transactions of the American Philosophical Society. 11: 91–95.
JSTOR 3231930
.

Loomis, F. B. (1900). "Die anatomie und die verwandtschaft der Ganoid-und Knochen-fische aus der Kreide-Formation von Kansas, U.S.A". Palaeontographica. 46: 213–283.

Mantell, G. 1822. The fossils of the South Downs; or illustrations of the geology of Sussex. London: Lupton Relfe. xiv + 327 pp.

Stewart, A. (1900). "Teleosts of the Upper Cretaceous". The University Geological Survey of Kansas. 6: 257–403.

Woodward, A. S. 1895. Catalogue of the fossil fishes in the British Museum. Part 3. British Museum of Natural History, London. pp. i-xliii, 1–544.

External links

Protosphyraena: A Late Cretaceous "Swordfish" at the Oceans of Kansas website. Includes detailed taxonomic history, life restorations, bibliography, many photos of fossil remains.
The most complete skeleton of Protosphyraena pernicosa yet found, on display at the Rocky Mountain Dinosaur Resource Center.