Some Birds of Prey from the Upper Pliocene of Kansas
Some birds of prey from the Upper Pliocene of Kansas.---Although many arian fossils from the local faunas of the Rexroad formation (Upper Pliocene), Meade County, Kansas, have now been reported, several species of birds of prey remain. These fossils, which Dr. C. W. Hibbard of The University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology a.nd his field parties collected, come from the Rexroad and Fox Canyon local faunas of the Rexroad formation. These two localities arc described by Hibbard (1950). The two local faunas have been treated as one in the past, but Hibbard's (1967) latest view is that they arc distinct. The Fox Canyon local fauna is now considered to be older than the Rexroad and is distinct on the basis of its small mammals (Hibbard, 1967). Birds have bccn reported previously from these local faunas by Wetmore (1944), Tordoff (1951, 1959), Brodkorb (1964, 1967), Collins (1964), Ford (1966), Murray (1967), a.nd Fcduccia (1967, 1968). The birds of prey represented arc as follows: Accipiter sp.---Two distal ends of tibiotarsi represent an accipitcr approximately the size of the Recent A. cooperi, but the clements arc not sufficiently diagnostic to warrant the naming of a new species or the definite assignment of the fossils to the Recent form. One bone, a 42-mm piece of the distal end of a left tibiotarsus (UMMP No. V57506, from the Rexroad local fau.na, loc. no. 3) measures 10.8 mm in width through condyles. The same measurement for eight specimens of Recent A. cooperi females gives a mcan of 10.1 mm, with a range of 9.2-10.9 mm. The smaller fossil, a 17.1-mm piece of the distal end of a left tibiotarsus (UMMP No. V45422, from the Rexroad local fauna, loc. UM-K3-53) measures 9.0 mm in width through condyles. The same measurement for five males of Recent A. cooperi gives a mean of 8.5 mm, with a range of 8.3-8.8 mm. Whether or not both fossils represent females or one a female and the other a male cannot bc dctcrmi.ned, but it is probably best to assume that only one species is represented. Buteo sp.--A fragment of a right coracold (UMMP No. V24767, from the Fox Canyon local fauna, loc. UM-K1-47) represents a large species of Buteo close in size and morphology to B. jamaicensis, but it is too fragmentary to permit allocation. No useful measurements could be taken.
REVISION OF "FALCO" RAMENTA WETMORE AND THE NEOGENE EVOLUTION OF THE FALCONIDAE
Falco" ramenta Wetmore 1936 is redescribed and moved to a new genus as Pedlofiierax ramenta (Wetmore). In addition to the holotypical distal end of the tarsometa- tarsus, this species is now known from a complete tarsometatarsus, humerus, and coracoid from mid-Miocene (Late Hemingfordian and Early Barstovian) fossil localities in the Sheep Creek and Olcott formations, northwestern Nebraska. Pediolfferax n. gen. is the primitive sister group of the Falconinae. The earliest fossil records now known of the Falconinae are a species of ?Falco from the late Miocene of Idaho and Falco medius from the late Miocene of the Ukrainian S.S.R. Received 5 June 1986, accepted 4 November 1986. WETMORE (1936) described "Falco" ramenta based on the distal end of a single right tarso- metatarsus from a mid-Miocene locality in Ne- braska. The holotype of this species apparently was compared only with Falco columbarius and F. sparverius, and differed from the former in having the distal vascular foramen of the tar- sometatarsus more elevated on the shaft in posterior view (Wetmore 1936). The incom- plete, minimally diagnostic nature of the ho- lotype has since caused the systematic position and validity of this species to be questioned (Jollie 1977). ! describe here new material from correlative mid-Miocene fossil localities in Nebraska of "Falco" ramenta, revise the systematic position of this species, document its stratigraphic range, and review all known Neogene records of the family Falconidae. MATERIAL AND METHODS
Fossil birds from southeastern Arizona
During February, March, and April, 1921, Dr. J. W. Gidley, assistant curator of fossil mammals. United States National Museum, jnade an extensive collection of fossils from newly discovered beds in the upper San Pedro Valley, Cochise County, Arizona. Among rich deposits of mammalian remains were found a small number of bones of birds, all considerably broken, that Doctor Gidley has kindly placed in the hands of the writer for study ; those that may be identified with any degree of certainty are described in the pages