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Sedimentology Of Marine Vertebrate Burial In The Miocene Pisco Fm., Peru, Monte A. Fleming

Loma Linda University Electronic Theses, Dissertations & Projects

The Miocene Pisco Basin of Peru is known for abundant, well-preserved marine vertebrate fossils (Esperante et al. 2000). Cetacean fossils are particularly abundant—so much so that we were able to locate 10 outcrops containing specimens in cross section, which allowed us to do detailed sedimentological studies of the beds surrounding the whales. We discovered that six of the 10 specimens were buried in channels; the details of the other four burials are too disparate to meaningfully group together in categories. Chapters 3, 4, and 5 describe and discuss the six specimens found in channels, while Appendix A contains descriptions and …