List of Talpidae from the Late Miocene of Slovakia, and measurements of the lower molars of Desmanella rietscheli from Dorn-Dürkheim

Central Europe is an area of high diversity for the Talpidae (Eulipotyphla, Mammalia) during the Late Miocene. The assemblages from Slovakia (Borský Svätý Jur, Krásno, Pezinok, Šalgovce, Studienka, Triblavina) are no exception with their abundant material representing eleven species. The uropsiline Desmanella is represented by D. rietscheli and D. dubia. Desmanini fossils are attributed to Archaeodesmana vinea, Archaeodesmana dissona nov. sp., Gerhardstorchia biradicata and Gerhardstorchia sp. The scalopine Proscapanus minor and P. austriacus are well recorded in the Vallesian localities and support the emergence of P. austriacus before the MN9/10 transition. Talpini and Urotrichini are especially rare and only represented by Talpa cf. minuta and Urotrichini gen. sp. indet. Finally, we identified in the MN9 locality of Borský Svätý Jur the youngest occurrence of Desmanodon in Europe with D. cf. fluegeli. The high Late Miocene central European diversity is partly explained by the co-occurence of the competing Scalopini and Talpini during the Vallesian, indicating high-resources environments. The decline of these tribes, followed by the success of the desmans during the Turolian, appears as a consequence of regional environmental changes.