| Taphophoyx | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Pelecaniformes |
| Family: | Ardeidae |
| Genus: | † Taphophoyx Steadman & Takano, 2019 |
| Species: | †T. hodgei |
| Binomial name | |
| †Taphophoyx hodgei Steadman & Takano, 2019 | |
Taphophoyx is an extinct genus of herons in the family Ardeidae. There is only one known species, Taphophoyx hodgei. [1]
Taphophoyx hodgei is believed to have lived in wetlands, like the great blue heron does today. [2]
T. hodgei was discovered in November 2017 in Montbrook Fossil Site, Florida by volunteers Toni-Ann Benjamin and Sharon Shears. On November 9th, 2017, a complete left coracoid was excavated, and a week later, a complete left scapula, two bones that have significant roles in flight. [3] Taphophoyx is said to have been the first new taxon to have been discovered at Montbrook Site. [4]
The name Taphophoyx means "Buried heron" in Greek and Latin, and hodgei is in honor of the landowner of Montbrook, Eddie Hodge, of whom also gives the common name for this species, "Hodge's tiger heron". [5]
The phylogenetic affinities of T. hodgei are not well resolved, but there is proof that the tiger herons and the boat-billed heron are the closest relatives of Taphophoyx, mainly evident on the faces articularis. [6]
A mastodon is a member of the genus Mammut, which was endemic to North America and lived from the late Miocene to the early Holocene. Mastodons belong to the order Proboscidea, the same order as elephants and mammoths. Mammut is the type genus of the extinct family Mammutidae, which diverged from the ancestors of modern elephants at least 27–25 million years ago, during the Oligocene.
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Botaurus is a genus of bitterns, a group of wading birds in the heron family Ardeidae. The genus includes species that were previously placed in the genus Ixobrychus.
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The Rodrigues night heron is an extinct species of heron that was endemic to the Mascarene island of Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean. The species was first mentioned as "bitterns" in two accounts from 1691–1693 and 1725–1726, and these were correlated with subfossil remains found and described in the latter part of the 19th century. The bones showed that the bird was a heron, first named Ardea megacephala in 1873, but moved to the night heron genus Nycticorax in 1879 after more remains were described. The specific name megacephala is Greek for "great-headed". Two related extinct species from the other Mascarene islands have also been identified from accounts and remains: the Mauritius night heron and the Réunion night heron.
Charles Whitney Gilmore was an American paleontologist who gained renown in the early 20th century for his work on vertebrate fossils during his career at the United States National Museum. Gilmore named many dinosaurs in North America and Mongolia, including the Cretaceous sauropod Alamosaurus, Alectrosaurus, Archaeornithomimus, Bactrosaurus, Brachyceratops, Chirostenotes, Mongolosaurus, Parrosaurus, Pinacosaurus, Styracosaurus ovatus and Thescelosaurus.
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