Whakakai
| Whakakai Temporal range: Late Oligocene,
| |
|---|---|
Scientific classification 
| |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Artiodactyla |
| Infraorder: | Cetacea |
| Parvorder: | Mysticeti |
| Genus: | †Whakakai Tsai and Fordyce, 2016 |
| Type species | |
| Whakakai waipata Tsai and Fordyce, 2016
| |
Whakakai is a genus of baleen whale from the Late Oligocene (Chattian) Kokoamu Greensand of New Zealand.
Classification[]
Phylogenetic analysis recovers Whakakai outside crown Mysticeti as the sister taxon of Horopeta.[1]
Paleobiology[]
Whakakai has been recovered in the same deposits that have also yielded the primitive odontocetes , , Otekaikea, and Waipatia, the eomysticetids Matapanui, Tohoraata, Tokarahia, and Waharoa, and the balaenomorphs Mauicetus and Horopeta.
References[]
- ^ Tsai, C.H., Fordyce R.E., 2016. Archaic baleen whale from the Kokoamu Greensand: earbones distinguish a new late Oligocene mysticete (Cetacea: Mysticeti) from New Zealand. Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand. doi:10.1080/03036758.2016.1156552
Genera of baleen whales and their extinct allies | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Categories:
- Oligocene mammals of Oceania
- Oligocene cetaceans
- Extinct animals of New Zealand
- Prehistoric cetacean genera