scholarly journals Early Oligocene chinchilloid caviomorphs from Puerto Rico and the initial rodent colonization of the West Indies

2020 ◽  
Vol 287 (1920) ◽  
pp. 20192806 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurent Marivaux ◽  
Jorge Vélez-Juarbe ◽  
Gilles Merzeraud ◽  
François Pujos ◽  
Lázaro W. Viñola López ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Distinct Species ◽  
South American ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Oligocene ◽  
Biogeographic History ◽  
Phylogenetic Affinities ◽  
Dispersal Events ◽  
South American Origin

By their past and present diversity, rodents are among the richest components of Caribbean land mammals. Many of these became extinct recently. Causes of their extirpation, their phylogenetic affinities, the timing of their arrival in the West Indies and their biogeographic history are all ongoing debated issues. Here, we report the discovery of dental remains from Lower Oligocene deposits ( ca 29.5 Ma) of Puerto Rico. Their morphology attests to the presence of two distinct species of chinchilloid caviomorphs, closely related to dinomyids in a phylogenetic analysis, and thus of undisputable South American origin. These fossils represent the earliest Caribbean rodents known thus far. They could extend back to 30 Ma the lineages of some recently extinct Caribbean giant rodents ( Elasmodontomys and Amblyrhiza ), which are also retrieved here as chinchilloids. This new find has substantial biogeographic implications because it demonstrates an early dispersal of land mammals from South America to the West Indies, perhaps via the emergence of the Aves Ridge that occurred ca 35–33 Ma (GAARlandia hypothesis). Considering both this new palaeontological evidence and recent molecular divergence estimates, the natural colonization of the West Indies by rodents probably occurred through multiple and time-staggered dispersal events (chinchilloids, then echimyid octodontoids (spiny rats/hutias), caviids and lastly oryzomyin muroids (rice rats)).

scholarly journals Mitochondrial genomes and thousands of ultraconserved elements resolve the taxonomy and historical biogeography of the Euphonia and Chlorophonia finches (Passeriformes: Fringillidae)

The Auk ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 137 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tyler S Imfeld ◽  
F Keith Barker ◽  
Robb T Brumfield
Keyword(s):  
Divergence Time ◽  
Strong Support ◽  
Species Level ◽  
Mitochondrial Genomes ◽  
South American ◽  
Isthmus Of Panama ◽  
Eastern Hemisphere ◽  
Biogeographic History ◽  
Dispersal Events ◽  
South American Origin

Abstract Relationships of the Neotropical finches in the genera Euphonia and Chlorophonia (Fringillidae: Euphoniinae) have been clarified by recent molecular studies, but species-level relationships within this group have not been thoroughly addressed. In this study, we sampled specimens representing every recognized species of these genera, in addition to 2 outgroup taxa, and used target enrichment to sequence thousands of ultraconserved element (UCE) loci, as well as mitochondrial DNA reconstructed from off-target reads, from each specimen to infer these relationships. We constructed both concatenation and coalescent-based estimates of phylogeny from this dataset using matrices of varying levels of completeness, and we generated a time-scaled ultrametric tree using a recently published fossil-based external calibration. We found uniformly strong support for a monophyletic subfamily Euphoniinae and genus Chlorophonia, but a paraphyletic Euphonia across UCEs and mitochondrial genomes. Otherwise, our inferred relationships were largely concordant with previous studies. Our time-tree indicated a stem divergence time of 13.8 million years ago for this lineage, followed by a relatively young crown age of only 7.1 myr. Reconstructions of biogeographic history based on this tree suggest a South American origin for crown Euphoniinae, possibly resulting from a transoceanic dispersal event from the Eastern Hemisphere, followed by 2 dispersal events into the Caribbean and as many as 6 invasions of North America coinciding with recent estimates of the age at which the Isthmus of Panama had completely formed. We recommend splitting Euphonia and resurrecting the genus Cyanophonia for the 3 blue-hooded species more closely related to Chlorophonia. Based on our results, we suspect that there is undescribed species-level diversity in at least one, possibly many, widespread and phenotypically diverse species.

scholarly journals An unpredicted ancient colonization of the West Indies by North American rodents: dental evidence of a geomorph from the early Oligocene of Puerto Rico

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurent Marivaux ◽  
Jorge Vélez‐Juarbe ◽  
Lázaro W. Viñola López ◽  
Pierre‐Henri Fabre ◽  
François Pujos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
North American ◽  
West Indies ◽  
The West ◽  
Early Oligocene ◽  
Dental Evidence

Systematics and distribution of the living and fossil small barn owls of the West Indies (Aves: Strigiformes: Tytonidae)

Zootaxa ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4830 (3) ◽  
pp. 544-564
Author(s):  
WILLIAM SUÁREZ ◽  
STORRS L. OLSON
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Distinct Species ◽  
New Combination ◽  
The West ◽  
The Bahamas ◽  
Separate Species ◽  
Fossil Species ◽  
The North ◽  
Barn Owls

After reviewing the systematics and distribution of the living and fossil small West Indian taxa of Tytonidae (Tyto), we reached the following conclusions: (1) Strix tuidara J. E. Gray, 1827, type locality of Brazil, is the earliest available and correct name to be used in a binomen for New World mainland barn owls; (2) the North American mainland subspecies Tyto tuidara pratincola (Bonaparte, 1838), new combination, is resident in the Bahamas (“Tyto perlatus lucayanus” Riley, 1913, is a synonym), where it probably did not colonize until after the European introduction of Rattus Fischer, in Hispaniola (Dominican Republic and Haiti) where it became established in the 20th century, and subsequently in Puerto Rico; (3) Tyto furcata (Temminck, 1827) of Cuba, Jamaica and the Cayman Islands is a different species restricted to its insular distribution, with “T. alba niveicauda” Parkes & Phillips, 1978, of the Isle of Pines (now Isla de la Juventud) as a synonym; (4) the distinct species Tyto glaucops (Kaup, 1852), now endemic to Hispaniola, once occurred in Puerto Rico, as the fossil species “T. cavatica” Wetmore, 1920, is here shown to be a synonym; (5) the smallest taxon Tyto insularis (Pelzeln, 1872) of the southern Lesser Antilles is treated as a separate species, in which the nominate subspecies T. i. insularis (St. Vincent, Grenada, and the Grenadines) differs slightly but consistently in coloration from T. i. nigrescens (Lawrence, 1878) of Dominica; (6) another barn owl, Tyto maniola, new species, of this group of small tytonids from the West Indies inhabited Cuba during part of the Quaternary, and is here named and described. 

scholarly journals Explosive range expansion of Eulophia graminea (Orchidaceae) in Puerto Ricio and the West Indies

Lankesteriana ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
James D. Ackerman ◽  
Normandie González-Orellana
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Range Expansion ◽  
West Indies ◽  
First Record ◽  
The State ◽  
Western Hemisphere ◽  
The West ◽  
The Bahamas ◽  
Rapid Spread ◽  
Southern Florida

Eulophia graminea Lindley (Orchidaceae), a native orchid of tropical and subtropical Asia, was first reported in the Western Hemisphere from populations in Miami, Florida, U.S.A. where it spread rapidly through the southern part of the state. Here we report the first record of this species for Puerto Rico and sightings in the Bahamas and Cuba, reflecting the rapid spread seen in southern Florida (U.S.A).

scholarly journals Biodiversity of Heteroptera in Puerto Rico: Part III. Conspectus of Pentatomomorpha: Aradoidea, Pyrrhocoroidea, Coreoidea, and Concluding Notes on Endemism and Biogeography

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-102
Author(s):  
Alejandro E. Segarra-Carmona ◽  
Rosa A. Franqui ◽  
Hariette Pérez-Martínez
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Puerto Rican ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Host Plants ◽  
New Records ◽  
Final Part ◽  
The West ◽  
Island Endemics

Superfamilies Aradoidea, Pyrrhocoroidea and Coreoidea from Puerto Rico are discussed as part of an updated account of Hemiptera: Heteroptera. In this final part, we present 48 species belonging to the three superfamilies, with six families known from Puerto Rico: Aradoidea: Aradidae (12); Pyrrhocoroidea: Largidae (1) and Pyrrhocoridae (3); and Coreoidea: Alydidae (5), Rhopalidae (7) and Coreidae (20). Taxonomic accounts presented here include synonymies, known distribution, lists of host plants and a listing of examined specimens. Taxonomical keys are also provided for the identification of all taxa included. Color plates for 43 species are included. Five species are new records for Puerto Rico: Brachyrhynchus membranaceus (F.), Leptoglossus confusus Alayo and Grillo, Eubule scutellata (Westwood), Mamurius cubanus Barber and Bruner, and Merocoris typhaeus (F.). Most species are widespread in the West Indies, with the largest number of island endemics in the Aradidae. A discussion of the origins, biodiversity, biogeography, and endemism of all Puerto Rican Pentatomomorpha is presented.

scholarly journals Book Reviews

1998 ◽  
Vol 72 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 125-199
Author(s):  
Redactie KITLV
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Puerto Rico ◽  
Puerto Rican ◽  
West Indies ◽  
University Of California ◽  
The West ◽  
British Guiana ◽  
Temple University ◽  
The Press ◽  
The Caribbean

-Valerie I.J. Flint, Margarita Zamora, Reading Columbus. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993. xvi + 247 pp.-Riva Berleant-Schiller, Historie Naturelle des Indes: The Drake manuscript in the Pierpont Morgan Library. New York: Norton, 1996. xxii + 272 pp.-Neil L. Whitehead, Charles Nicholl, The creature in the map: A journey to Eldorado. London: Jonathan Cape, 1995. 398 pp.-William F. Keegan, Ramón Dacal Moure ,Art and archaeology of pre-Columbian Cuba. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1996. xxiv + 134 pp., Manuel Rivero de la Calle (eds)-Michael Mullin, Stephan Palmié, Slave cultures and the cultures of slavery. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1995. xlvii + 283 pp.-Bill Maurer, Karen Fog Olwig, Small islands, large questions: Society, culture and resistance in the post-emancipation Caribbean. London: Frank Cass, 1995. viii + 200 pp.-David M. Stark, Laird W. Bergad ,The Cuban slave market, 1790-1880. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. xxi + 245 pp., Fe Iglesias García, María Del Carmen Barcia (eds)-Susan Fernández, Tom Chaffin, Fatal glory: Narciso López and the first clandestine U.S. war against Cuba. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1996. xxii + 282 pp.-Damian J. Fernández, María Cristina García, Havana USA: Cuban exiles and Cuban Americans in South Florida, 1959-1994. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. xiii + 290 pp.-Myrna García-Calderón, Carmen Luisa Justiniano, Con valor y a cómo dé lugar: Memorias de una jíbara puertorriqueña. Río Piedras: Editorial de la Universidad de Puerto Rico, 1994. 538 pp.-Jorge Pérez-Rolon, Ruth Glasser, My music is my flag: Puerto Rican musicians and their New York communities , 1917-1940. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995. xxiv + 253 pp.-Lauren Derby, Emelio Betances, State and society in the Dominican Republic. Boulder CO: Westview Press, 1995. xix + 162 pp.-Michiel Baud, Bernardo Vega, Trujillo y Haiti, Volumen II (1937-1938). Santo Domingo: Fundación Cultural Dominicana, 1995. 427 pp.-Danielle Bégot, Elborg Forster ,Sugar and slavery, family and race: The letters and diary of Pierre Dessalles, Planter in Martinique, 1808-1856. Elborg & Robert Forster (eds. and trans.). Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1996. 322 pp., Robert Forster (eds)-Catherine Benoit, Richard D.E. Burton, La famille coloniale: La Martinique et la mère patrie, 1789-1992. Paris: L'Harmattan, 1994. 308 pp.-Roderick A. McDonald, Kathleen Mary Butler, The economics of emancipation: Jamaica & Barbados, 1823-1843. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1995. xviii + 198 pp.-K.O. Laurence, David Chanderbali, A portrait of Paternalism: Governor Henry Light of British Guiana, 1838-48. Turkeyen, Guyana: Dr. David Chanderbali, Department of History, University of Guyana, 1994. xiii + 277 pp.-Mindie Lazarus-Black, Brian L. Moore, Cultural power, resistance and pluralism: Colonial Guyana 1838-1900. Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press; Mona, Kingston: The Press-University of the West Indies, 1995. xv + 376 pp.-Madhavi Kale, K.O. Laurence, A question of labour: Indentured immigration into Trinidad and British Guiana, 1875-1917. Kingston: Ian Randle; London: James Currey, 1994. ix + 648 pp.-Franklin W. Knight, O. Nigel Bolland, On the March: Labour rebellions in the British Caribbean, 1934-39. Kingston: Ian Randle; London: James Currey, 1995. viii + 216 pp.-Linden Lewis, Kevin A. Yelvington, Producing power: Ethnicity, gender, and class in a Caribbean workplace. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1995. xv + 286 pp.-Consuelo López Springfield, Alta-Gracia Ortíz, Puerto Rican women and work: Bridges in transnational labor. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996. xi + 249 pp.-Peta Henderson, Irma McClaurin, Women of Belize: Gender and change in Central America. New Brunswick NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1996. x + 218 pp.-Bonham C. Richardson, David M. Bush ,Living with the Puerto Rico Shore. José Gonzalez Liboy & William J. Neal. Durham: Duke University Press, 1995. xx + 193 pp., Richard M.T. Webb, Lisbeth Hyman (eds)-Bonham C. Richardson, David Barker ,Environment and development in the Caribbean: Geographical perspectives. Mona, Kingston: The Press-University of the West Indies, 1995. xv + 304 pp., Duncan F.M. McGregor (eds)-Alma H. Young, Anthony T. Bryan ,Distant cousins: The Caribbean-Latin American relationship. Miami: North-South-Center Press, 1996. iii + 132 pp., Andrés Serbin (eds)-Alma H. Young, Ian Boxill, Ideology and Caribbean integration. Mona, Kingston: The Press-University of the West Indies, 1993. xiii + 128 pp.-Stephen D. Glazier, Howard Gregory, Caribbean theology: Preparing for the challenges ahead. Mona, Kingston: Canoe Press, University of the West Indies, 1995. xx + 118 pp.-Lise Winer, Richard Allsopp, Dictionary of Caribbean English usage. With a French and Spanish supplement edited by Jeanette Allsopp. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. lxxviii + 697 pp.-Geneviève Escure, Jacques Arends ,Pidgins and Creoles: An introduction. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1995. xiv + 412 pp., Pieter Muysken, Norval Smith (eds)-Jacques Arends, Angela Bartens, Die iberoromanisch-basierten Kreolsprachen: Ansätze der linguistischen Beschreibung. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1995. vii + 345 pp.-J. Michael Dash, Richard D.E. Burton, Le roman marron: Études sur la littérature martiniquaise contemporaine. Paris: L'Harmattan. 1997. 282 pp.

Keys to the genera and species of blow flies (Diptera: Calliphoridae) of the West Indies and description of a new species of Lucilia Robineau-Desvoidy

Zootaxa ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 2663 (1) ◽  
pp. 1 ◽  
Author(s):  
TERRY WHITWORTH
Keyword(s):  
Puerto Rico ◽  
New Species ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Species Distributions ◽  
The West ◽  
Blow Flies ◽  
First Time ◽  
A New Species ◽  
Key Characters

Keys to 11 genera and 21 species of Calliphoridae found or likely to be found in the West Indies are given. Species distributions and key characters are discussed. Lucilia fayeae sp. nov. is described from numerous specimens from Dominica, Puerto Rico, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent. Calliphora maestrica Peris et al. is redescribed and the male of the species is described for the first time.

Future Impossible Communities

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-102
Author(s):  
Jossianna Arroyo
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Puerto Rico ◽  
West Indies ◽  
Special Section ◽  
The West ◽  
Spanish Caribbean ◽  
The Past ◽  
Critical Intervention ◽  
Key Interventions

This response essay reviews the six contributions to the special section “Con-Federating the Archipelago: The Confederación Antillana and the West Indies Federation.” These key interventions on the Spanish Caribbean Confederation projects in the nineteenth century and the West Indies Federation in the twentieth century provoke the following questions: Could we call these two Caribbean confederation projects failures if their centrality in Caribbean political imaginaries suggests otherwise? What are some of the insights that these two projects could offer to Caribbean sociohistorical processes, culture, and political developments? Even though these two projects seem to share a similar political goal, they are also radically different. The author reviews the contributions to the special section in dialogue with examples from Puerto Rico in order to assess the critical intervention in theories of nationalism produced by the past projects of federation and the possible futures they give rise to.

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