New fossil Asian palm civets (Carnivora, Viverridae) from the Siwaliks of Pakistan

Abstract

The Neogene fossil record of Asian palm civets (Viverridae of the subfamilies Paradoxurinae and Hemigalinae) is extremely rare and scarce, and until now mostly restricted to Africa. Here we describe two new species of extinct Asian palm civets from the Siwaliks of Pakistan. Two isolated lower carnassial teeth were collected from Upper Miocene deposits of the Dhok Pathan Formation in the vicinity of Hasnot, Jhelum, and from Middle Miocene deposits of the Chinji Formation in Kanhatti, Khushab, Punjab province of Pakistan. The Hasnot specimen belongs to the genus Mioparadoxurus, previously reported from Haritalyangar, a Late Miocene locality of northern India. The unique morphology of the specimen (e.g., larger and stouter paraconid, high-crowned talonid with three cuspids, talonid larger than trigonid, undivided paraconid and hypoconulid), in addition to its small size, allows us to attribute it to the new species Mioparadoxurus micros nov. sp. This occurrence extends the geographical range of the genus into Pakistan. Mioparadoxurus is closely related to the extant palm civet Paradoxurus and thus constitutes one of the rare fossil members of the subfamily Paradoxurinae in Asia. The Kanhatti specimen is also unique in its morphology. It is small, has low hypoconid cusplets, and a unique combination of characters of its talonid cuspids. We attribute this lower carnassial to the new genus and species Parakichechia sikandari nov. gen., nov. sp., which shows similarities to the extinct African genus Kichechia, placed in either the subfamily Paradoxurinae or Hemigalinae. Although the material of these two new species does not permit full investigation of phylogenetic relationships between fossil and extant palm civets, it highlights the importance of South Asian Neogene deposits for understanding the evolutionary history of modern Asian faunas.