Wound morphologies on the Recent Mediterranean echinoid Sphaerechinus granularis (Lamarck) from the Italian island of Giglio allow the reconstruction of predation events by sparid fish. These lethal attacks leave characteristic bite marks and other features including scratch marks of teeth, bitten off spines, and fragmented jaw supports. The bite marks consist of semicircular indentation on the edge of a gaping wound showing intraplate fragmentation. The attack is initiated on the upper side of the echinoid test. Comparison of predation traces to jaw and tooth morphologies allows the sparid fish Diplodus vulgaris (Geoffroy Saint-Hillaire) and Diplodus sargus (L.) to be identified as the most likely predators. This type of fish predation is compared to other known predatory attacks on echinoid taxa in the Mediterranean Sea. The fossilization potential of this type of predation is discussed with respect to test preservation, based on the degree of fragmentation, abrasion and encrustation of the individual tests, and the specific habitat in which these echinoids are found.

Fossil data collecting is an essential stage of every paleontological undertaking. Although there is a consensus regarding the fundamental importance of sedimentary and stratigraphic context, there is still some debate surrounding the need to record the exact position of a fossil in relation to other elements within the same deposit (provenance). Here we provide a practical guide for the in-field use of the Total Station (TST, electronic equipment for xyz coordinates measurements), a tool that has seen wide application in archaeology but has been largely neglected in paleontology. With the TST, recording the provenance of in situ fossils can be done quickly and with great precision. We also present a configuration tutorial showing how to use the equipment, based on our experience in the Solimões Formation (upper Miocene, Acre basin, Brazil), highlighting both its advantages and disadvantages for recording fossil provenances.

In the paleoecological literature, drilling frequency—the percent of specimens in a prey taxon with complete drill holes—is commonly interpreted as an indication of a predator's preference. Such taxon-specific drilling frequencies are often compared with one another and related to underlying prey characteristics such as cost-benefit ratio or body size. Although this approach can demonstrate a predator's relative preference for one prey type over another, it fails to consider whether predation on any prey type is greater than would be expected by a predator without preference. Here we develop a null model for evaluating predator preference in paleoecology by considering drilling frequency in the framework of Manly's alpha, which is a well-established model in the ecological literature that has been used to evaluate predator preferences. In effect, Manly's alpha normalizes taxon-specific drilling frequencies with all potential prey types in the community, allowing for a statistically rigorous test of the null hypothesis that drilling predation, and therefore predator preference, on any given prey type is equivalent to all other available prey types in the community. After discussing the statistical basis for the model, we demonstrate the model's utility by applying it to a published dataset of drilling predation on Pliocene bivalves from Langenboom, Netherlands. The Manly's alpha approach, which uses the same data (i.e., drilling frequencies) that are commonly collected by paleoecologists, provides a null hypothesis to more rigorously assess predator preferences and inherently includes community context for predator-prey interactions in the fossil record.

The Permian Rio do Rasto Formation (Paraná Basin) crops out in southern Brazil and was deposited under fluvio-lacustrine settings. A singular outcrop located in the Aceguá municipality (Rio Grande do Sul State) represents a sequence of three distinct levels of paleosols in which rhizoliths and a single vertebrate burrow were recovered. The latter has a sub-vertical orientation, a slightly curved shape and a gross morphology and simple architecture that are consistent with aestivation burrows produced by lungfishes. The occurrence of this structure, in association with the features of the paleosols, indicates a seasonal climate with drought events. Additionally, a tonstein layer is interbedded in the paleosol sequence, indicating the influence of volcanic ash falls in the paleoenvironment. Zircons were collected from this level and dated using U-Pb techniques and the obtained age is 270.61 1.76/-3.27 Ma (Roadian). The paleoenvironmental context of this outcrop is in accordance with a dry, seasonal climate of southwestern Pangaea during the early Guadalupian.