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.