The evolution of reproduction within Testudinata as evidenced by the fossil record

• Main Author: Lawver, Daniel Ryan
• Other Authors: Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Frankie Jackson; David Varricchio (co-chair), Frankie D. Jackson was a co-author of the article, 'A review of the fossil record of turtle reprodution: eggs, embryos, nests, and copulating pairs' in the journal 'Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History' which is contained within this thesis., Armand H. Rasoamiaramanana and Ingmar Werneburg were co-authors of the article, 'An occurrence of fossil eggs from the Mesozoic of Madagascar and a detailed observation of eggshell microstructure' in the journal 'Journal of vertebrate paleontology' which is contained within this thesis., Frankie D. Jackson was a co-author of the article, 'An accumulation of turtle eggs with embryos from the Campanian (upper Cretaceous) Judith River Formation of Montana' in the journal 'Cretaceous research' which is contained within this thesis., Frankie D. Jackson was a co-author of the article, 'A fossil egg clutch from the stem turtle Meiolania platyceps: implications for the evolution of turtle reproductive biology' in the journal 'Journal of vertebrate paleontology' which is contained within this thesis.
• Format: Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science 2017
• Subjects: Turtles; Reproduction; Fossils; Howe Island; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: https://scholarworks.montana.edu/xmlui/handle/1/13101

Although known from every continent except Antarctica and having a fossil record ranging from the Middle Jurassic to the Pleistocene, fossil turtle eggs are relatively understudied. In this dissertation I describe four fossil specimens, interpret paleoecology and conduct cladistic analyses in order...