ANUROS AMPHIBIA ANURA DO PLEISTOCENO FINALHOLOCENO INICIAL DE ITAPIPOCA ESTADO DO CEARÁ BRASIL: TAXONOMIA PALEOECOLOGIA E TAFONOMIA

Abstract (English)

This work reports the occurrence of fossil remains of anurans attributed to the taxa Rhinella jimi, R. schneideri e Anura indet., from tank deposits of João Cativo Paleontological Site (Late Pleistocene-early Holocene), municipality of Itapipoca, Ceará State. This is the fi rst formal description of fossil remains of bufonids in Brazilian fossiliferous deposits. The presence of R. jimi and R. schneideri at João Cativo site suggests an arid paleoenvironment with marked seasonality. During raining periods, the tanks probably were foraging, breeding and dying sites for the paleoanurofauna of the region. The taphonomic analysis of the material, the morphological study of the tanks and actuopaleontological observations suggest that the anurans died inside these depressions, thus being autochthonous, in contrast to the mammals, which are considered parautochthonous, as they died around the tanks and were transported into their fi nal site of accumulation by debris fl ows. Furthermore, the comparison between the taphonomic attributes of anurans and mammals confi rms the occurrence of temporal- and spatial-mixing in the tank deposits of João Cativo.