Kaszab Zoltán (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 64. (Budapest 1972)

Jánossy, D.: Middle Pliocene microvertebrate fauna from the Osztramos Loc. 1. (Northern Hungary)

present, mostly indeterminable according to oral communication by E. KROLOPP. Some of them resemble typical Mediterranean-Pliocene forms. Fragments of the exoskeleton of millipedes (Diplopoda) are not rare. Amphibia — lieptilia The bones of different frogs, urodeles and chiefly the great quantity of vertebrae of snakes, as well as the squamae of Ophisaurus, are characteristic to the material of both localities. An armour-fragment and a phalanx of a land-turtle are present in locality 1/b. Aves The bird-remains are very fragmentary and hard to identify. However, some of them are remarkable indeed. A proximal fragment of a coracoid certainly belonged to a Galliform, but it differs morphologically from the same bone of all European members of the order, as well as from Gallus and FrancoUnus. The fragment agrees in some details with that of Colinus virginiamis, but even more with that described as Walaeortyx intermedia BALLMANN (19(39, table I. fig. 1-2). This piece may therefore be assigned with some doubt, to the genus Palaeortyx. There is in the material of 1/c an ulnare, morphologically nearest to Colinus virginianus, which I relegate provisionally to the same taxonomical unit. Two ungual phalanges, originating from a medium-sized bird of prey, agree all the more with those of Accipiter, without contending an actual identity. They are also much more compressed laterally than those of the European species. Although the identification of Passeriform bones is said to be very difficult, one fragment, originating from this group, seems to be an exception from this statement. It is a proximal fragment of a humerus of a smaller song bird. The special form of the epiphysis, especially that of the tuberculum mediale, differs from that of all European families of this group and agrees with that of the Pycnonotidae (esp. Pycnonotus capensis) and the Turdoididae (esp. Turdoides squamiceps). Therefore this fragment is assignable to a tropical song bird whose closer identification is unfortunately impossible in absence of a convenient comparative material. The identification of some other small song bird bones i« rather hopeless. Mammalia Talpidae Talpa sp. There are present in both localities some dozens of bones, isolated teeth, and a fragment of a skull, originating from moles. It is not possible to take exact measurements since entire extremity bones are absent. A part of the remains fall in the size category of Talpa fossilis PETÉNYI (e. g. a proximal fragment of an ulna), the others are smaller. For the latter ones I use provisionally the name Talpa aff. csarnotana KRETZOI. 1959, the taxon nearest in size and stratigraphically. The remains are unfortunately unsuitable for further investigations.