Gordon Hill caves, Crooked Island (Holocene of Bahamas)

Where: Bahamas (22.8° N, 74.3° W: paleocoordinates 22.8° N, 74.3° W)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• outcrop-level geographic resolution

When: Holocene (0.0 - 0.0 Ma)

• The deposit containing the bird bones was a relatively hard stratum about one foot in thickness, buried under from six to twelve inches of sand. Contained ash and charcoal, many opercula of conch shells, some crude pottery, and a few bone artifacts and tortoiseshell fishhook. The bones seem fairly old, and are considered pre-Columbian though there is no definite criterion to establish their actual age.

• bed-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: cave; sandstone

Size classes: macrofossils, mesofossils

Collected by F.G. Rainey, A. Armour in 1933-1934; reposited in the YPM

Primary reference: A. Wetmore. 1938. Bird remains from the West Indies. The Auk 55:51-55 [M. Clapham/M. Clapham]more details

Purpose of describing collection: general faunal/floral analysis

PaleoDB collection 145366: authorized by Carlos Jaramillo, entered by Catalina Suarez-Gomez on 01.06.2013, edited by Matthew Clapham

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Aves
 Procellariiformes - Procellariidae
Pterodroma cahow Nichols and Mowbray 1916 Bermuda petrel
Pterodroma cahow Nichols and Mowbray 1916 Bermuda petrel
Pterodroma cf. hasitata Kuhl 1820 black-capped petrel
Part of Pterodroma cahow in Wetmore 1938 (YPM 2434)
Puffinus lherminieri Lesson 1839 Audubon's shearwater
Only carpometacarpus YPM 2433
 Suliformes - Sulidae
Sula leucogaster Boddaert 1783 brown booby
 Pelecaniformes - Threskiornithidae
"Guara alba" = Eudocimus albus
"Guara alba" = Eudocimus albus Linnaeus 1758 White ibis
 Psittaciformes - Psittacidae
"Amazona leucocephala" = Psittacus leucocephalus
"Amazona leucocephala" = Psittacus leucocephalus Linnaeus 1758 Cuban parrot
 Columbiformes - Columbidae
"Columba leucocephala" = Patagioenas leucocephala
"Columba leucocephala" = Patagioenas leucocephala Linnaeus 1758 white-crowned pigeon
1 is Pterodroma cahow
 Passeriformes - Mimidae
Mimus gundlachii Cabanis 1855 Bahama mockingbird
 Passeriformes - Corvidae
Corvus nasicus Temminck 1826 Cuban crow
 Accipitriformes - Pandionidae
Pandion haliaetus Linnaeus 1758 osprey
 Charadriiformes - Laridae
"Sterna fuscata" = Onychoprion fuscatus
"Sterna fuscata" = Onychoprion fuscatus Linnaeus 1766 sooty tern