Casa Blanca
Basic information
Sample name: Casa Blanca

Sample aka: TMM 42486

Reference: J. W. Westgate. 1988. Biostratigraphic implications of the first Eocene land-mammal fauna from the North American coastal plain. Geology 16:995-998 [ER 4179]
Geography
Country: United States

State: Texas


County: Webb


Coordinate: 27° 32' N, 99° 26' W
Coordinate basis: stated in text

Scale: quarry

Formation: Laredo

Time interval: Middle Eocene

Zone: Uintan

Ma: 46.55

Age basis: AEO

Geography comments: "an exposure in the high-water spillway on the southeast side of Lake Casa Blanca... 2.5 km due east of the Laredo International Airport"
the quarry is "just above the middle" of the formation and "within the boundaries of the upper Lutetian and lower Bartonian beds" based on correlation with the Cook Mountain Formation "of east and central Texas" to the northeast

Environment
Lithology: sandstone

Taphonomic context: fluvial deposit

Habitat comments: the formation "locally is composed of marginal marine sand, clay, and marl" and the fossiliferous level is a sandstone lens within a siltstone unit according to Fig. 1, but this is said to be "an oyster shell hash" by Walton (1993a)

Methods
Life forms: carnivores,primates,ungulates,marine mammals,other small mammals

Sampling methods: quarry,screenwash

Sample size: 116 specimens

Museum: Texas Memorial Museum

Sampling comments: fossils were collected by "excavations" and screenwashing, with "approximately 3,000 kg of matrix" washed using "nylon bag mesh" and another 2,000 kg using coarser "window screen"
detailed taxonomic accounts of the same taxa and the same counts are provided by Westgate (1990)
there are at 10 nine rodent species in total, of which Mytonomys robustus is enumerated in the 1988 and 1990 papers; Laredomys riograndensis was described by Wilson and Westgate (1991); Pauromys sp. and Pauromys simplex were described by Walton (1993a); and Microeutypomys karenae was described by Walton (1993b)
this leaves Thisbemys sp., Microparamys sp., two ischyromyids, and a cylindrodontid without counts, making it impossible to include the rodents as a group in the inventory

Metadata
Sample number: 4641

Contributor: John Alroy

Enterer: John Alroy

Created: 2025-01-06 09:09:44

Modified: 2025-01-06 09:09:44

Abundance distribution
20 species
5 singletons
total count 116
geometric series index: 33.4
Fisher's α: 6.967
geometric series k: 0.8460
Hurlbert's PIE: 0.9055
Shannon's H: 2.6301
Good's u: 0.9570
Each square represents a species. Square sizes are proportional to counts.
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