Charactosuchus is an extinct genus of crocodilian. It was assigned to the family Crocodylidae in 1988.Carroll, R. L.(1988). Vertebrate Paleontology and Evolution. WH Freeman and Company, New York Specimens have been found in Colombia, Brazil, Jamaica, and possibly Florida and South Carolina. It was gharial-like in appearance with its long narrow snout but bore no relation to them, being more closely related to modern crocodiles than to gharials.
Species South America The type species, C. fieldsi, has been found from the Villavieja Formation at the Konzentrat-Lagerstätte La Venta in Colombia and dates back to the Middle Miocene (Laventan). It has also been found in the Mayoan to Montehermosan Urumaco Formation at Urumaco in Venezuela,Charactosuchus at Fossilworks.org and in the Solimões Formation in Acre State, Brazil, along with C. sansoai,Souza Filho, J. P. (1991). Charactosuchus sansaoi, uma nova espécie de Crocodilidae (Crocodylia) do Neógeno do Estado o Acre, Brasil. Actas do XII Congreso Brasileiro de Paleontologia, 36. and the possible species C. mendesi (sometimes assigned to Brasilosuchus).
Caribbean In 1969, a lower jaw of a crocodilian that dated back to the Lutetian stage of the Eocene was found in the Chapelton Formation of Saint James Parish, Jamaica, and was described as belonging to a new species of Charactosuchus named C. kugleri.Portell, R. W., Donovan, S. K., and Domning, D. P. (2001). Early Tertiary vertebrate fossils from seven Rivers, Parish of St. James, Jamaica, and their biogeographical implications. Biogeography of the West Indies 191-200 However, this species may be considered synonymous with Dollosuchus, according to later papers.Domning, D. P. and Clark, J. M. (1993). Jamaican Tertiary marine Vertebrata. In: R.M. Wright and E. Robinson (eds.), Biostratigraphy of Jamaica. Geological Society of America Memoir 182:413–415.
North America Isolated teeth thought to be from the genus have been found from Florida and South Carolina and are of early Pliocene age. This was thought to be evidence of the interchange between North and South American faunas, with the genus first appearing in North America and then migrating down into Colombia and Brazil.Estes, R. and Báez, A. (19850. Herpetofaunas of North and South America during the Late Cretaceous and Cenozoic: evidence for interchange? In: F.G. Stehli and S.D. Webb (eds.), The Great American Biotic Interchange, 139–197. Plenum Press, New York. This theory is no longer accepted,Langston, W. and Gasparini, Z. (1997). Crocodilians, Gryposuchus and the South American gavials. In: R.F. Kay, R.H. Madden, R.L. Cifelli, and J. Flynn (eds.), Vertebrate Paleontology in the Neotropics. The Miocene fauna of La Venta, Colombia, 113–154. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington. although the presence of Charactosuchus from Jamaica may suggest a European origin, with the genus migrating across either the De Geer or Thule land bridges.Agustí, J. and Antón, B. 2002. Mammoths, Sabretooths and Hominids: 65 Million Years of Mammalian Evolution in Europe. 313 pp. Columbia Univ. Press, New York
References
External links Charactosuchus in the Paleobiology Database