Dugongs
Submitted by Ben Nafus
Paleo Artwork By Ben Nafus

Dugongs, together with manatees, are known as seacows, and members of the aquatic order, Sirenia. Their earliest fossils are found in sedimentary rocks of Eocene age (53.5 to about 34 million years ago). They are probably the earliest mammal to return to a marine environment. Clearly, this adaptation was caused by the evolution of the prehistoric Tethy's sea and with it the appearance of sea grasses, one of the animals favorite foods. (The Tethy's sea was the earliest form of the Mediterranean sea that separates Africa from Europe. At that time it extended east-west from western Europe to southern Asia)

Examination of Dugong pelvic fossils reveals that the earliest animals had hind legs, but like the whales lost them in the process of evolving to life in a marine environment. This adaptation had occurred by the upper Eocene as the earliest known sea cows were already well developed sirenians, their fossils being found in such distant places as Egypt, Europe and the West Indies. It is evident that these animals achieved wide distribution by swimming along the coastlines of a then tropical world with a very warm, worldwide climate. Their preferred habitat being grassy swamps and other relatively shallow, grassy estuaries and bays effected by tidal action. Indeed, present day Dugongs living along the coastlines of India, Malaysia and southwest Asia, live in a habitat comparable to that of prehistoric Kern County 15 million years ago. This was a shallow coastal area or estuary of a large river like the prehistoric Kern river. Here the water plants grew in abundance in a tropical climate that supplied this animal's every need foodwise.

The fossil history of the Dugong is not well known. However, it is thought to share a common ancestry with the elephants along with such aquatic animals as the now extinct, Desmostylus, and Paleoparadoxia.

Reference:
Savage, RJG & Long, MR. 1986. Mammal Evolution. Facts On File Publications. Steel, S. & Harvey, A. 1989. The Encylopedia of Pre-Historic Life. Gramercy Publishing Co.

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