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Other Localities:

The following localities were not included in the analysis, because the fossils found there are either entirely endemic, poorly preserved, doubtfully biogenic, or (usually) some combination of the above.

CANADA:

Hofmann, H. J., Narbonne, G. M., and Aitken, J. D. 1990. Ediacaran remains from intertillite beds in northwestern Canada. Geology 18(12): 1199-1202.
The fossils described here, while probably biogenic, substantially predate other known "Ediacara-type fossils," and hence were not included.

INDIA:

Bhatt, D. K. 1990. (A comment on the paper, "Ediacaran medusoids from the Krol Formation, Naini Tal Syncline, Lesser Himalaya" by V. K. Mathur and Ravi Shanker. . . ) Journal of the Geological Society of India 36: 536-540.

Maithy, P. K. 1992. Palaeobiology of Vindhyan. Palaeobotanist 40: 52-72.

Mathur, V. K. and Shanker, R. 1989. First record of Ediacaran fossil elements from the Krol Formation, Naini Tal Syncline. Journal of the Geological Society of India 34: 245-254.

Mathur, V. K. and Shanker, R. 1990. Ediacaran medusoids from the Krol Formation, Naini Tal Syncline, Lesser Himalaya. Journal of the Geological Society of India 36: 74-78.

Raha, P. K., Moitra, A. K., Das Sarma, D. C., Ashok Kumar, P., and Rama Rao, M. R. 1991. (Abstract) Search for microfossils in the Bhima and Kaladgi-Badami Sequence of south India. Records of the Geological Survey of India 124(2): 10.

Shanker, R. and Mathur, V. K. 1992. Precambrian-Cambrian sequence in Krol belt and additional Ediacaran fossils. Geophytology 22: 27-39.

Sharma, M., Shukla, M., and Venkatachala, B. S. 1992. Metaphyta and Metazoan fossils from Precambrian sediments of India: a critique. The Palaeobotanist 40: 8-51.

Shukla, M., Sharma, M., Bansal, R. and Venkatachala, B. S. 1991. Pre- Ediacaran fossil assemblages from India and their evolutionary significance. Memoirs of the Geological Society of India 20: 169-179.
Four localities in India with putative "Ediacara fossils" are reported. The pre-Ediacaran assemblages from central India (e.g. Shukla et al., 1991) are not well studied or named, not clearly figured, and in any case are far older than the scope of this study. The same applies to the pre-Vendian forms reviewed by Maithy (1992), such as Misraea, Ramapurea, and Amjohrea; some of these are more likely algal, similar to the widespread carbonaceous form Chuaria.

The putative Vendian-age fossils in north India reprted by Mathur and Shanker (1989 et seq.) have been debated in the Indian literature (e.g. Bhatt, 1990; and further comments and replies). Some are probably not biogenic; others may be (reviewed in Sharma et al.,1992). The finding needs confirmation and further study, as does the report of medusoids and Dickinsonia from Rajasthan (Maithy, 1992).

A new locality in the Halkal Shale, near Kolkur in southern India, is reported to yield Ediacara-type medusoids (Raha et al., 1991), but these forms have not been confirmed or figured, to my knowledge.

IRAN:

Hahn, G., and Pflug, H. D. 1980. Ein neuer Medusen-Fund aus dem Jung-Präkambrium von Zentral-Iran. Senckenbergiana lethaea 60(4/6): 449-461.

Personal observations of fossils in the collection of Dr. B. Hamdi, 1993.
See also Glaessner, 1984, who tentatively identified Charnia and another unidentified medusoid. The fossils that I have seen appear to be biogenic; however, the specimens identified as Charnia that I have examined did not appear to be Charnia and may be molds of shelly fossils, suggesting a Cambrian date for at least some of these fossils. The medusoid Persimedusites is not known from anywhere else. More study is clearly warranted.

IRELAND:

Crimes, T. P., Insole, A., and Williams, B. P. J. 1995. A rigid-bodied Ediacaran biota from Upper Cambrian strata in Co. Wexford, Eire. Geological Journal 30: 89-109.
These fossils, in the genera Ediacaria and Nimbia, appear biogenic, and are important for their implications for survival of Ediacaran lineages and for taphonomy. However, they fall far outside the temporal range of this study.

LAKE BAIKAL:

Personal observations in collections of the Paleontological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia. 1993.
See also sources for Russia as a whole, as well as Glaessner (1984). The material I have examined personally, of a putative saclike fossil named Baikalina, is possibly biogenic but not convincing, and in any case is endemic to the Baikal locality (although it somewhat resembles the form Ernietta from Namibia). It also closely resembles the central Australian form Arumberia, which, however, is a dubiofossil at best (see notes for central Australia).

MOROCCO:

Houzay, J.-P. 1979. Empreintes attribuables à des méduses dans la série de base de l'Adoudounien (Précambrien terminal de l'Anti-Atlas, Maroc). Géologie Méditerranéenne 6(3): 379-384.
These medusoids have no obvious counterparts elsewhere.

RIVER MAYA, SIBERIA:

Listed by Glaessner (1984: fig. 1.8; p. 88). The enigmatic large fossils Suvorovella and Majella from this locality are usually considered algae, but some Russian workers apparently consider them to be medusoids. I have not seen any original material from this locality myself, and find no reason to include these reported finds at this time.

SARDINIA:

Debrenne, F., and Naud, G. 1981. Méduses et traces fossiles supposées précambriennes dans la formation de San Vito, Sarrabus, Sud-Est de la Sardaigne. Bulletin de la Societé Géologique de France, 7e Série 23(1): 23-31.
This is a report of a single "medusoid" taxon, Ichnusia, so far not found anywhere else.

SOUTH AMERICA:

Hahn, G., Hahn, R.; Leonardos, O. H.; Pflug, H. D.; Walde, D. H. G. 1982. Körperlich erhaltene Scyphozoen-Reste aus dem Jungpräkambrium Brasiliens. Geologica et Palaeontologica 16: 1-18.
See also Conway Morris et al., 1990 for a review of cloudiniid fossils from South America. Otherwise, only one putative Vendian fossil is known from South America, the organic, tubelike Corumbella, a proposed fossil scyphozoan polyp. As far as I am aware it is not known from anywhere else.

SPAIN:

Dozy, J. J. 1984. A Late Precambrian Ediacara-type fossil from Galicia (NW Spain). Geologie en Mijnbouw 63: 71-74.
This is a report of a single "frondlike" fossil; while I believe that it is biogenic, it is too poorly preserved to identify.

SWEDEN:

Seilacher, A. 1993. Early multicellular life: Late Proterozoic fossils and the Cambrian explosion. In: Bengtson, S. (ed.) Early Life on Earth. Nobel Symposium No. 84. Columbia University Press, New York. pp. 389-400.
Seilacher (1993) figures a number of forms that he considers to be the internal sand skeletons of polypoid organisms, from the Mickwitzia Sandstone of Sweden (Lower Cambrian) as well as the Ordovician of Jordan. Most of these forms postdate the Vendian are are not considered in this analysis, but Seilacher also considers that some Vendian fossils may be of this type. I have not included these forms here, since an explanation of these forms as artefactual still seems likely.

WALES:

Cope, J. C. W. 1977. An Ediacara-type fauna from South Wales. Nature 268: 624.

Cope, J. C. W. 1982. Precambrian fossils of the Carmarthen area, Dyfed. Nature in Wales, New Series 1(2): 11-16.
Fossils here are restricted to simple "medusoids." A possible occurrence of the more complex fossil Tribrachidium was discounted by Glaessner (1984; see general sources above).

WEST AFRICA:

Bertrand-Sarfati, J., Moussine-Pouchkine, A, Amard, B., and Aït Kaci Ahmed, A. 1995. First Ediacaran fauna found in western Africa and evidence for an Early Cambrian glaciation. Geology 23: 133-136.
This paper reports fossils from the Taoudenni Basin of West Africa; they are simple medusoids referred to Medusinites and Nimbia. The medusoids are quite nondescript, and their age is uncertain; it is possible that they are older than most of the Ediacara biotas.

WESTERN AUSTRALIA:

Cruse, T., Harris, L. B., and Rasmussen, B. 1993. The discovery of Ediacaran trace and body fossils in the Stirling Range Formation, Western Australia; Implications for sedimentation and deformation during the 'Pan- African' orogenic cycle. Australian Journal of Earth Sciences 40: 293-296.
The biota appears sparse. The fossils described so far are a few simple 'medusoids,' as yet unnamed.