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Stable Isotope Ecology of a Late Miocene Population of Gomphotherium productus (Mammalia, Proboscidea) from Port of Entry Pit, Oklahoma, USA

¹ Department of Geological Sciences and Museum of Paleontology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109

The stable carbon and oxygen isotope compositions of serial samples of enamel from tusks of Gomphotherium productus (Mammalia, Proboscidea) from Port of Entry Pit, Oklahoma (early Hemphillian North American Land Mammal Age, ca. 7.5 Ma), were measured to examine intra-annual and interannual variation. Sample series from each of six tusks spanned approximately one year of tusk growth. Carbon isotope compositions range from –11.3 to –9.2 (VPDB) and exhibit no pattern of seasonal variation, indicating the diet of gomphotheres at Port of Entry Pit was dominated by C₃ vegetation throughout the year. Phosphate oxygen isotope composition (¹⁸O_p) ranges from 18.9 to 22.2 (VSMOW); carbonate oxygen isotope composition (¹⁸O_c) ranges from 26.1 to 30.1 (VSMOW). None of the tusks exhibit seasonal variation in ¹⁸O, and the average within-tusk range in ¹⁸O_p is 1.7. Neither the fluorine composition of the specimens nor the relationship between ¹⁸O_p and ¹⁸O_c values from splits of the same samples suggest significant post-depositional alteration. The oxygen isotope data imply that Hemphillian meteoric water had ¹⁸O values that are indistinguishable from modern values in the region today. However, because polar ice sheets were smaller and mean ocean water ¹⁸O lower than present, the estimates of meteoric water composition from gomphothere tusk ¹⁸O_p are consistent with warmer mean annual temperatures during the Hemphillian. The within-tusk variations in ¹⁸O_p are consistent with similar or much reduced patterns of seasonal temperature variation in comparison to today, depending on air mass flow during the late Miocene. Alternative explanations include seasonal migratory behavior and reliance by the gomphotheres at Port of Entry Pit on sources of drinking water with relatively constant ¹⁸O values.

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