Marais de l'Ermitage (Réunion)
| Marais de l'Ermitage | ||
|---|---|---|
| Geographical location | Réunion , Mascarene Islands | |
| Tributaries | Ravine de l'Ermitage | |
| Drain | Ravine de l'Ermitage | |
| Location close to the shore | Saint-Gilles | |
| Data | ||
| Coordinates | 21 ° 4 ′ 0 ″ S , 55 ° 16 ′ 5 ″ E | |
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| Altitude above sea level | <50 m | |
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particularities |
Fossil deposit in a swamp |
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Marais de l'Ermitage (German: Einsiedler-Sumpf) is a marshland on the Mascarene island of Réunion . It is located 0.7 km from the west coast between the towns of Saint Gilles and Saint Leu in a low sedimentary basin less than 50 m above sea level. The place has been known internationally as a fossil deposit since 1990. A 80 cm thick layer of low-fossil peat overlays a 30 to 40 cm deep brecciawhich contains abundant vertebrate fossils, volcanic rocks, corals and shell fragments. This layer overlays a layer of marine sediment made up of coral sand, corals and fossils of marine molluscs. The area is soaked in water and quickly filled with water as soon as the first test holes were drilled. In the fossil deposit Marais de l'Ermitage were hundreds of bones of Réunion giant tortoise ( cylindraspis indica encouraged) to light. Bat and bird bones have been found extremely rarely and include subfossil material from the Reunion owl ( Mascarenotus grucheti ), the Mascarene coot ( Fulica newtoni ), the Reunion night heron ( Nycticorax duboisi ), the Reunion goose ( Alopochen kervazoi ), the Mauritius duck ( Anas theodori ) and the Réunionibis ( Threskiornis solitarius ).
The deposit was largely destroyed by road construction work in the past.
literature
- Cecile Mourer-Chauvire, Roger Bour, Sonia Ribes, Francois Moutou: The Avifauna of Reunion Island (Mascarene Islands) at the Time of the Arrival of the First Europeans. In: Storrs L. Olson: Avian Paleontology at the Close of the 20th Century: Proceedings of the 4th International Meeting of the Society of Avian Paleontology and Evolution, Washington DC, 4-7 June 1996. 1996, pp. 2-4. (on-line)
- Julian Pender Hume: Contrasting taphofacies in ocean island settings: the fossil record of Mascarene vertebrates. In: JA Alcover, P. Bover (Ed.): Proceedings of the International Symposium “Insular Vertebrate Evolution: the Palaeontological Approach”. (= Monografies de la Societat d'Història Natural de les Balears. 12). 2005, pp. 129-144. (PDF, online)