Oligocene (pt 15): Land of the Fire-Beasts

Pyrotherium

Even at the dawn of the Oligocene, South America had already long been isolated from the northern continents, giving it the opportunity to evolve its own distinct mammalian fauna, with many animals quite unlike those seen elsewhere. Most of these strange animals would die out millions of years later when the Isthmus of Panama finally formed. The armadillos are among the exceptions.

Armadillos first evolved on the continent during the previous epoch, if not earlier, but most of the older fossils are incomplete, making it difficult to trace their detailed relationships. The oldest reasonably complete armadillo skulls belong to Kuntinaru, first described in 2011. This lived in Bolivia towards the end of the Oligocene, around 27 million years ago and would already have looked much like modern armadillos, albeit somewhat smaller than the species most familiar to North Americans.