AUTHOR=Govender Romala , Marx Felix G. 

TITLE=New cetacean fossils from the late Cenozoic of South Africa

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Earth Science

VOLUME=10

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/earth-science/articles/10.3389/feart.2022.1058104

DOI=10.3389/feart.2022.1058104

ISSN=2296-6463

ABSTRACT=<p>Marine sediments from the western coast of southern Africa record the origin of the Benguela Upwelling System, one of the most productive in the world. High productivity, in turn, is reflected in a diverse marine mammal fossil assemblage, comprising whales, dolphins and a phocid seal. Here, we describe new records of baleen whale (mysticete) fossils from the early Pliocene localities of Saldanha Steel, Milnerton and Langebaanweg, as well as several potentially younger specimens trawled from offshore sediments. The presence of the extinct rorquals <italic>Diunatans</italic> and <italic>Fragilicetus</italic> suggests biogeographical links with the eastern North Atlantic and, thus, potentially antitropical population structuring. The trawled specimens also include rorquals (e.g., the blue whale, <italic>Balaenoptera</italic> cf. <italic>musculus</italic>), as well as a right whale (<italic>Eubalaena</italic>) and a pygmy right whale (<italic>Caperea</italic>). The latter is the first fossil of this family every discovered in Africa, and only the seventh specimen to be reported worldwide.</p>