Whatcheeriidae Temporal range: Early Carboniferous
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Pederpes finneyae | |
Scientific classification ![]() | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Clade: | Sarcopterygii |
Clade: | Tetrapodomorpha |
Clade: | Stegocephali |
Family: | †Whatcheeriidae Clack, 2002 |
Type genus | |
†Whatcheeria Lombard and Bolt, 1995
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Genera | |
Whatcheeriidae is an extinct family of stem-tetrapods which lived in the Mississippian sub-period, a subdivision of the Carboniferous period. It contains the genera Pederpes, Whatcheeria, and possibly Ossinodus. Fossils of a possible whatcheeriid have been found from the Red Hill locality of Pennsylvania. If these remains are from a whatcheeriid, they extend the range of the family into the Late Devonian and suggest that advanced tetrapods may have lived alongside primitive tetrapod ancestors like Hynerpeton and Densignathus.[1] They also imply that a very long ghost lineage of whatcheeriids lived through Romer's gap, a period during the Early Carboniferous conspicuously lacking in tetrapod remains.[2]