Puppigerus

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title: "Puppigerus" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["cenozoic-turtles-of-north-america", "eocene-reptiles-of-europe", "cheloniidae", "eocene-reptiles", "fossil-taxa-described-in-1870", "eocene-reptiles-of-asia", "prehistoric-turtle-genera", "taxa-named-by-edward-drinker-cope", "extinct-turtles", "fur-formation"] description: "Extinct genus of turtles" topic_path: "general/cenozoic-turtles-of-north-america" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puppigerus" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Extinct genus of turtles ::

| fossil_range = Eocene, | image = Puppigerus parkinsonii 34.jpg | image_alt = | image_caption = P. camperi fossil on display at the Teylers Museum | taxon = Puppigerus | authority = | subdivision_ranks = Species | subdivision = * †P. breviceps (Owen, 1841)

• †P. camperi (Gray, 1831)
• †P. grandaevus (Leidy, 1861)
• †P. parvisecta Cope, 1870

Puppigerus is an extinct genus of sea turtle from the Eocene. It is known from finds in the United States, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, and Uzbekistan.

Taxonomy

Puppigerus was described by Edward Drinker Cope in 1870. As of 1997, P. camperi and P. crassicostata were considered the two valid species. P. camperi was later thought to be the sole species of the genus until the 2005 discovery of P. nessovi from Uzbekistan.

Description

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9f/Puppigerus_camperi_.jpg" caption="Restoration of ''P. camperi''"] ::

Fossils show that Puppigerus was around 90 cm long, and its weight has been estimated as being somewhere around 9 -. Although cheloniids such as Puppigerus first appeared during the Cretaceous, several traits of this genus give it more of a resemblance to modern cheloniids: its "huge" eyes pointed sideways rather than upward, unlike more primitive cheloniids, and its shell was completely ossified. The pygal (rearmost plate of the upper shell) also lacked the notch seen in earlier cheloniids. It was a herbivore, living on marine vegetation, and one of the "best-adapted" prehistoric turtles; its "unusually large" eyes helped it gather as much light as possible, and its specialized jaw structure kept it from accidentally breathing in water. Its front legs were flipper-like, but its hind legs were not developed in this manner, suggesting it would have spent considerable time on dry land, where females would have laid their eggs.

Palaeoecology

Puppigerus camperi is known from the London Clay and Bracklesham Beds of England, as well as the Sables de Bruxelles and the Sables de Wemmel of Belgium. P. nessovi is known from the Dzheroi 2 locality of Uzbekistan. A Puppigerus species is also known from the Fur Formation of Denmark.

References

References

1. Scudder, Samuel Hubbard. (1882–1884). "Nomenclator Zoologicus: an Alphabetical List of All Generic Names That Have Been Employed by Naturalists for Recent and Fossil Animals from the Earliest Times to the Close of the Year 1879". [[United States Government Printing Office.
2. Cope, E. D.. (1870). "Synopsis of the extinct Batrachia, Reptilia and Aves of North America". Transactions of the American Philosophical Society.
3. Moody, Richard T. J.. (1997). "Ancient Marine Reptiles". [[Academic Press]].
4. Averianov, A. O.. (2005). "A new sea turtle (Testudines, Cheloniidae) from the Middle Eocene of Uzbekistan". [[Paleontological Journal]].
5. Strauss, Bob. "Puppigerus". [[The New York Times Company]].
6. Palmer, Douglas. (2009). "Prehistoric Life: the Definitive Visual History of Life on Earth". [[Dorling Kindersley.
7. Nielsen, E.. (1959). "Eocene Turtles from Denmark". Dansk Geologisk Forening.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::