The Tertiary Record of Rodents in North America (Topics in Geobiology, 12)

Nearly half of the known species of mammals alive today (more than 1600) are rodents or "gnawing mammals" (Nowak and Paradiso, 1983). The diversity of rodents is greater than that of any other order of mammals. Thus, it is not surprising that the fossil record of this order is extensive and fossil material of rodents from the Tertiary is known from all continents except Antarctica and Australia. The purpose of this book is to compile the published knowledge on fossil rodents from North America and present it in a way that is accessible to paleontologists and mammalogists interested in evolutionary studies of ro­ dents. The literature on fossil rodents is widely scattered between journals on paleontology and mammalogy and in-house publications of museums and universities. Currently, there is no single source that offers ready access to the literature on a specific family of rodents and its fossil history. This work is presented as a reference text that can be useful to specialists in rodents (fossil or recent) as weIl as mammalian paleontologists working on whole faunas. Because the diversity of rodents in the world is essentially limitless, any monograph that included all fossil rodents would similarly be limitless. Hence, this book is limited to the re cord of Tertiary rodents of North America. The several species of South American (caviomorph) rodents that invaded North America near the end of the Tertiary are also not included in this text. Front Matter....Pages i-xiii Front Matter....Pages 1-1 Introduction....Pages 3-5 Specialized Cranial and Dental Anatomy of Rodents....Pages 7-21 Origin of Rodents....Pages 23-25 Classification of Rodents....Pages 27-34 Front Matter....Pages 35-35 Ischyromyidae....Pages 37-54 Sciuravidae....Pages 55-66 Cylindrodontidae....Pages 67-76 Protoptychidae....Pages 77-83 Aplodontidae....Pages 85-98 Mylagaulidae....Pages 99-109 Sciuridae....Pages 111-124 Eutypomyidae....Pages 125-133 Castoridae....Pages 135-148 Eomyidae....Pages 149-162 Heliscomyidae....Pages 163-171 Heteromyidae....Pages 173-188 Florentiamyidae....Pages 189-197 Geomyidae....Pages 199-212 Zapodidae....Pages 213-222 Cricetidae—Part 1....Pages 223-237 Front Matter....Pages 35-35 Cricetidae—Part 2 (Microtidae)....Pages 239-247 Monotypic Families....Pages 249-254 Rodents Not Referable to Recognized Families....Pages 255-267 Front Matter....Pages 269-269 Changes in the Rodent Fauna....Pages 271-278 Tertiary Rodent Faunas of Other Continents....Pages 279-285 Back Matter....Pages 287-319 This monograph is the first compilation of all known data on fossil rodents in North America. The author includes illustrations of all fossil families of rodents, the phylogenies for all familes, a discussion of the problematical taxa of rodents which are not referable to known families, and lists of all described fossil species. His work will serve as an indispensible reference for the paleontologist who wishes to identify specimens, and for the mammologist studying fossil history