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The Royal Society, Biology Letters, 6(5), p. 833-837, 2009

DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2009.0440

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Miocene skinks and geckos reveal long-term conservatism of New Zealand's lizard fauna

Journal article published in 2009 by Michael S. Y. Lee, Mark N. Hutchinson, Trevor H. Worthy ORCID, Michael Archer ORCID, Alan J. D. Tennyson, Jennifer P. Worthy, R. Paul Scofield
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

The New Zealand (NZ) lizard fossil record is currently limited to late Quaternary remains of modern taxa. The St Bathans Fauna (early Miocene, southern South Island) extends this record to 19–16 million years ago (Myr ago). Skull and postcranial elements are similar to extant Oligosoma (Lygosominae) skinks and Hoplodactylus (Diplodactylinae) geckos. There is no evidence of other squamate groups. These fossils, along with coeval sphenodontines, demonstrate a long conservative history for the NZ lepidosaurian fauna, provide new molecular clock calibrations and contradict inferences of a very recent (less than 8 Myr ago) arrival of skinks in NZ. ; Michael S. Y. Lee, Mark N. Hutchinson, Trevor H. Worthy, Michael Archer, Alan J. D. Tennyson, Jennifer P. Worthy and R. Paul Scofield