Teleoceras

Teleoceras is an extinct genus of grazing rhinoceros. It lived in North America during the Miocene and Pliocene epochs during the Hemingfordian to the end of Hemphillian from around 17.5 to 4.9 million years ago.[4][5]

Teleoceras
Temporal range: Barstovian-Hemphillian
~15.97–4.9 Ma
Specimen at the Natural History Museum of LA
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Perissodactyla
Family: Rhinocerotidae
Genus: †Teleoceras
Hatcher, 1894
Type species
†Teleoceras major
Species[1]
  • †T. aepysoma
  • †T. aginense
  • †T. americanum
  • †T. brachyrhinum
  • †T. hicksi
  • †T. fossiger
  • †T. guymonense
  • †T. major
  • †T. medicornutum
  • †T. meridianum
  • †T. proterum
Synonyms
  • †Mesoceras (Cook, 1930)[2]
  • †Paraphelops Lane, 1927[3]

Description
Restoration of T. fossiger
T. proterum and Barbourofelis loveorum

Teleoceras had much shorter legs than modern rhinos, and a barrel chest, making its build more like that of a hippopotamus than a modern rhino. Osborn based on this, suggested in 1898 that it was semi-aquatic and hippo like in habits. This idea persisted for around a century, but has recently been discounted by isotopic evidence.[5] Teleoceras is now thought to have been a terrestrial grazer on C3 plants.[5] Teleoceras had a single small nasal horn.[6]

Discovery

Teleoceras is the most common fossil in the Ashfall Fossil Beds of Nebraska. In fact, its remains were so numerous and concentrated that the building housing the greatest concentration of Ashfall fossils is called the "Rhino Barn". Most of the skeletons are preserved in a nearly complete state. One extraordinary specimen includes the remains of a Teleoceras calf trying to suckle from its mother.[7] This animal was featured in the episodes "Are Rhinos Dinos?" and "Dawn Of The Cats" of the Paleoworld series.

Extinction

Teleoceras went extinct in North America alongside Aphelops at the end of the Hemphillian, most likely due to rapid climate cooling, increased seasonality and expansion of C4 grasses, as isotopic evidence suggests that the uptake of C4 plants was far less than contemporary horses.[5]

References
  1. Prothero, 2005, p. 94.
  2. McKenna & Bell, 1997, p. 483.
  3. Prothero, 2005, p. 122.
  4. (Prothero, 2005)
  5. Wang, B.; Secord, R. (2020). "Paleoecology of Aphelops and Teleoceras (Rhinocerotidae) through an interval of changing climate and vegetation in the Neogene of the Great Plains, central United States". Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology. 542. doi:10.1016/j.palaeo.2019.109411.
  6. Palmer, D., ed. (1999). The Marshall Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Animals. London: Marshall Editions. p. 265. ISBN 1-84028-152-9.
  7. Ashfall Fossil Beds

Bibliography
  • McKenna, Malcolm C., and Bell, Susan K. 1997. Classification of Mammals Above the Species Level. Columbia University Press, New York, 631 pp. ISBN 0-231-11013-8
  • Prothero, Donald R. 2005. The Evolution of North American Rhinoceroses. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 218 pp. ISBN 0-521-83240-3
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