Abstract

CABRAL-PERDOMO, Miguel Angel; BRAVO-CUEVAS, Víctor Manuel; PEREZ-PEREZ, Alexis  and  GARCIA-CABRERA, Norberto. Description of camelids and felids of the Pie de Vaca site, Late Cenozoic of Puebla, central Mexico, and some paleobiological considerations. Bol. Soc. Geol. Mex [online]. 2018, vol.70, n.2, pp.397-416. ISSN 1405-3322.  https://doi.org/10.18268/bsgm2018v70n2a9.

The Pie de Vaca locality in the State of Puebla stands out for its important abundance of fossil mammal footprints, among them, the most representatives have been referred to camelids and felids. The purpose of the present study was the formal characterization of this set of footprints and comment on some paleobiological aspects related to their size, speed, and mode of progression of the track-makers. The sample consists of 233 footprints including 154 referable to nine trackways produced by camelids and 79 referable to three trackways produced by felids. The characterization of the tracks was made by comparing their size and morphology with others produced by fossil and recent taxa. The impressions of camelids, based on their shape and size, were designated to the icnospecies Lamaichnum guanicoe because they show the typical morphological pattern of this group of artiodactyls. It is suggested that they were produced by some member of the genus Hemiauchenia, which corresponds to the most common camelid of the Late Cenozoic of Mexico. On the other hand, the tracks of felids were only referred to the morphofamily Felipedidae due to the bad preservation of its ichnotaxonomic characters; however, being larger than traces of the ichnogenera Felipeda, Pycnodactylopus, Pumaeichnum and Mitsupes, it is suggested that they were produced by some form of medium to large size, a machairodontid or a pantherine, for instance. The mode of progression of both producers corresponds to that of relatively fast walking organisms that move at a speed lower than 4 m/s. The direction and number of individuals of camelids trackways, are indicative of gregarious behavior, probably associated with a certain social organization. In the case of felids, solitary or couple behavior is proposed.

Keywords : ichnite; camelids; felids; pace; stride; progression.