Tertiary Echinoids from Papua New Guinea

Abstract

Tertiary echinoid faunas from four different environments are described from three localities in Papua New Guinea (PNG). The fauna from the Middle Miocene Langimar Beds at Aseki village, Morobe Province, is dominated by near-surface, sand dwelling clypeasteroid echinoids Echinodiscus bisperforatus Leske, 1778 and Laganum depressum Lesson in L. Agassiz, 1841. The fauna from the Upper Oligocene-Lower Miocene Padowa Beds in the Sagarai valley, Milne Bay Province, is dominated by sand and sandy-mud burrowing spatangoid echinoids Brisaster latifrons (A. Agassiz, 1898) and Brissopsis ?luzonica (Gray, 1851). The rich echinoid fauna from the Lower Pliocene Kairuku Formation on Yule Island, Central Province, includes sea-grass meadow dwelling, and highly turbulent, shallow-water dwelling forms. The fauna includes the clypeasteroid echinoids L. depressum and fibulariid (?)gen. et sp. nov., a temnopleurid echinoid Temnotrema macleayana (Tenison-Woods), a phymosomatoid echinoid stomechinid (?)gen. et sp. nov., and spatangoid echinoids B. latifrons and Ditremaster sp. indet. Five of the eight described echinoid genera from the Tertiary of PNG still live in waters of the Indo-Pacific today.