Class Mammalia
Order Cingulata
Family Glyptodontidae
Sites.
Late Blancan: San Simon Fauna (Morgan and White 2005).
Literature. Morgan and White 2005.
Glyptodonts are large,
armored relatives of the armadillos. Individual scutes of the armor, and occasional
articulated portions, are found from the Blancan to Irvingtonian deposits along the Rio
Grande Rift. Morgan and Lucas (2005), based on the revision of the genus by Gillette
and Ray (1981), assigned all New Mexican glyptodonts to G. arizonae; the Arizona specimens likewise are of this species.
Fig. 1. Three articulated glyptodont scutes and an edgewise view to show thickness. Apparently white glue was used to maintain the contacts; some still obscures junctions. UTEP specimens from the vicinity of Fabens.
Fig. 2. Part of the carapace of Glyptotherium arizonae, from a display in the Centennial Museum.
Sites.
Late Blancan: Caballo (Morgan et al. 2011); California Wash (Morgan and White 2005); Curtis Ranch (Lindsay 1984); La Union (Morgan and Lucas 2003); Virden (Morgan et al. 2008).
Early Irvingtonian: El Paso (UTEP); Adobe Ranch (Morgan and Lucas 2003); Tijeras Arroyo (Morgan and Lucas 2005); Vicinity of Fabens (UTEP); Western Mobile Gravel pit (Morgan and Lucas 2005).
Literature. Gillette and Ray 1981; Lindsay 1984; Morgan and Lucas 2003, 2005; Morgan and White 2005; Morgan et al. 2008; Morgan et al. 2011.
Glyptotherium texanum was the smallest of the North American glyptodonts and apparently was ancestral to G. arizonae (Kurtén and Anderson 1980).
Sites.
Late Blancan: 111 Ranch (Morgan and White 2005)
Literature. Kurtén and Anderson 1980; Morgan and White 2005.
Last Update: 21 Jan 2013