Siderops

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title: "Siderops" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["jurassic-temnospondyls", "prehistoric-amphibians-of-australia", "chigutisauridae", "fossil-taxa-described-in-1983", "early-jurassic-amphibians", "toarcian-genera", "jurassic-animals-of-australia", "monotypic-prehistoric-amphibian-genera"] description: "Extinct genus of amphibians" topic_path: "geography/australia" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siderops" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Extinct genus of amphibians ::

| fossil_range = Early Jurassic, Late Toarcian ~ | image = Siderops.jpg | image_caption = Holotype skeleton | genus = Siderops | parent_authority = Warren and Hutchinson, 1983 | species = kehli | authority = Warren and Hutchinson, 1983 Siderops (from the Greek sideros meaning “iron” and -ops meaning “face” ) is an extinct genus of chigutisaurid temnospondyl from Early Jurassic of Australia, containing the species S. kehli (named after the Kehl family of ‘Kolane’, Wandoan, Queensland where the fossil was found).

Discovery

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Siderops2DB.png" caption="[[Life restoration"] ::

It is solely known from the holotype specimen, which consists of a nearly complete skull with mandible and postcrania were found within the Westgrove Ironstone Member of the Evergreen Formation of the Surat Basin in Queensland. Dating to the late Toarcian at approximately 176.6 ma. Siderops was large, with a skull width 70 cm wide and a total length of 2.6 -.

Classification

Siderops belongs to the clade Brachyopomorpha, a subdivision of the greater clade Temnospondyl and placed in the superfamily Brachyopoidea and belonging in the Chigutisauridae family. Shown below is a cladogram of Brachyopoidea adapted from Warren et al. (1983) and Ruta et al. (2007).

|label1=Brachyopoidea |1={{clade |label1=Brachyopidae |1={{clade |1={{clade |1=Sinobrachyops |2=Xenobrachyops}} |2={{clade |1=Banksiops |2=Batrachosaurus |3={{clade |1=Vanastega |2=Vigilius}} |4=Batrachosuchus}} }} |label2=Chigutisauridae |2={{clade |1=Chigutisaurus |2={{clade |1={{clade |1=Compsocerops |2=Kuttycephalus}} |2={{clade |1=Pelorocephalus |2=Siderops

References

References

1. Hart, Lachlan J.. (2023-08-03). "A new chigutisaurid (Brachyopoidea, Temnospondyli) with soft tissue preservation from the Triassic Sydney Basin, New South Wales, Australia". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
2. (1983). "The Last Labyrinthodont? A New Brachyopoid (Amphibia, Temnospondyli) from the Early Jurassic Evergreen Formation of Queensland, Australia". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.
3. (December 2019). "Refined age and geological context of two of Australia's most important Jurassic vertebrate taxa (Rhoetosaurus brownei and Siderops kehli), Queensland". Gondwana Research.
4. (2005-05-01). "A giant brachyopoid temnospondyl from the Upper Triassic or Lower Jurassic of Lesotho". Bulletin de la Société Géologique de France.
5. Ruta, M.. (2007). "A supertree of Temnospondyli: cladogenetic patterns in the most species-rich group of early tetrapods". Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

::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. ::