BULLETIN OF THE FLORIDA STATE MUSEUM BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES Volume 10 Number 4 A PLEISTOCENE AVIFAUNA FROM HAILE, FLORIDA J. David Ligon Of 4' a . I <. .. 0 /853 * UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA Gainesville 1965 Numbers of· the BULLETIN OF THE FLORIDA STATE MUSEUM are pub- lished at irregular intervals. Volumes contain about 300 pages and are not nec- essarily completed in any one calendar year. WALTER AuFFENBERG, Managing Editor OLIVER L. AUSTIN, JR., Editor Consultants for this issue: H. Howard A. Wetmore Communications concerning purchase or exchange of the publication and all manuscripts should be addressed to the Managing Editor of the Bulletin, Florida State Museum, Seagle Building, Gainesville, Florida. 82601 Published January 8, 1966 Price for this issue $.50 A PLEISTOCENE AVIFAUNA FROM HAILE, FLORIDA J. DAVID LIGON 1 SYNOPSIS: A newly discovered fossil fauna near Haile, Alachua County, Florida, represents the Rancholabrean stage of the Pleistocene. The great concentration of small vertebrate remains, especially birds and mammals, is probably due to predatory birds. The avifauna of 72 species represents 12 orders and 26 families; 12 5pecies are extinct. Five living species, Tumpanuchus cupido, Actitis macu- latia, Cocot/zus americanus, Cistothorus platensis, and Vireo griseus are new to the fossil record, and four others, Clangula ht/emalis, Numenius americanus, Re- curt)irostra americana, and Asio #ammeus, are new to the PIeistocene of Florida. The avifauna shows northern, western or southwestern, and Neotropical affinities; its composition indicates the close proximity of a lake or pond with accompanying marsh and wet meadow during the time of deposition, and that open prairie and scrub were also close at. hand. INTRODUCI'ION Several fossil-bearing deposits of Pliocene and Pleistocene age have been found near Haile, in the western part of Alachua County, Florida, (Fig. 1), but relatively little has been published on their fau- has. Amphibians from Pleistocene deposits have been reported by Tihen (1952) and by Coin·and Auffenberg (1955). Pliocene amphib- ians have been recorded by Coin and·Auffenberg (1955) and Auffen- berg (1957). Reptiles from both epochs have been reported by Auffen: berg (1954, 1955, 1956, 1968). Brodkorb (1958) listed a. Pleistocene avifauna of seven species from one. Haile locality and described an extinct rail of the genus Po,zana from the same site (Brodkorb, 1954); he later (1968) described several new species of Pliocene birds from Haile localities. Though the Haile mammal fauna has not been re- ported in detail, several species listed in some of the above papers serve as chronological indicators. Each of the Haile quarries is designated by a Roman humeral and areas of fossil concentration within a quarry are subdivided and 1 This paper is based on a thesis presented to the Department of Biology of the Undversity of Florida in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. The study was supported by National Science Foundation grant 019595 to Dr. Pierce Brodkorb. The auth6r's present address is Museum of Zoology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Manuscript received 21 September 1964.-ED. Ligan, J, David. 1965. A Pleistocene Avifauna from Haile, Florida. Bull. Flor- ida State Mus., vol. 10, no. 4, pp. 127-158. 128 BULLETIN FLORIDA STATE MUSEUM Vol. 10 separated by letter (Fig. 1). The avifauna of Haile XI B forms the subject of this paper. The non-avian vertebrates have been studied by J. Howard Hutchison. Haile is about 4 miles northeast of the town of Newberry, Alachua County, Florida. The fossil site is in a limestone quarry just east of Highway 285 and 8.4 miles north of the junction of Highways 285 and 26. It is in the SW44 of Sec. 18, T 9 S, R 17 E. The 88.5 foot altitude of the nearby Newberry railroad station cor- responds to that of the Wicomico terrace (70-100 feet), which has gen- erally been considered to represent the Sangamon interglacial stage of the Pleistocene (Cooke, 1945: 248). However, the Haile XI B de- posit is here assigned to the Rancholabrean period, following Hib- bard et al. (1965). This term encompasses the Illinoian, Sangamon, and Wisconsin ages of the Pleistocene and is used for faunas not clearly correlated with the glacial and interglacial stages. The diffi- culties of dating Florida late Pleistocene localities are discussed com- prehensively by Bader (1957) and Auffenberg (1968). Both these au- thors point out the problems involved in using the supposed marine terraces as indicators of interglacial periods. Recently Weigel (1962) has published radio-carbon datings that indicate the marine terraces may be one cycle older than previously thought.. Thus the Wicomico terrace represents, under his scheme, the Yarmouthian interglacial period. This is unlikely and further illustrates the problems involved in assuming that these terraces are marine and that they do repre- sent interglacial periods. The bones reported on here were deposited in a cavity in the Ocala limestone which underlies almost all of Florida. The free circulation of water through this limestone has resulted in solution of the rock (Cooke, 1945: 54). Subterranean caves formed by solution occasion- ally collapse under the weight of overlying sediments. Limestone rubble, abundant in the matrix at Haile XI B, may indicate the col- lapse of a cave roof, as at Reddick I (Brodkorb, 1957). The bones were deposited in what was apparently a drainage out- let or tunnel at the lowermost (southeast) corner of the collapsed cave (Fig. 2). This was completely filled with clay and sand until quarry- ing operations unplugged the outer end of the tunnel. As subsequent erosion has only partly emptied the solution cavity of soil, the exact size of the chamber is still indeterminable. The bone-bearing matrix, consisting of sands and clays, occurred principally along the walls near the end of the tunnel opposite the col- lapsed cave. Stratified layers of soil indicate that the matrix was deposited by water, probably the runoff of heavy rains. The cross- I A PA/-/ SECTION 23 1y c 1 'A ALACHUA .SECTION 24 SECTION ..... 24