TRANSACTIONS OF THE SAN DIEGO SOCIETY OF NATURAL HISTORY Volume 20 Number 14 pp. 247-276 20 November 1984 The Late Wisconsinan Vertebrate Fauna from Deadman Cave, Southern Arizona ,^ Jim I. Mead Center for the Study of Early Man. Institute for Quaternary Studies, University of Maine, Orono, Maine 04469 NOVg Edward L. Roth J^^J^^fO Department of Biology, Howard Payne University, '^'^iMi/Tv, Brownwood, Texas 76801 *Y Thomas R. Van Devender Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum, Route 9, Box 900, Tucson, Arizona 85743 David W. Steadman Division of Birds, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC. 20560 Abstract. We report a particularly rich assemblage of fossil vertebrates from a cave in southern Arizona. This fauna provides new data for reconstructing the inadequately known Late Pleistocene-Early Holocene biota of the Sonoran Desert and nearby mountains. The vertebrate fauna of Deadman Cave includes 5 amphibians, 25 reptiles (13 lizards and 12 snakes), 12 birds, and 22 mammals for a total of 64 species. Only one amphibian {Bufo woodhousei), three reptiles (Callisaurus draconoides, Phrynosoma modestum, Gyalopium canum), and one mammal {Microtus species) are locally extirpated, although all still occur in southern Arizona. An unidentified icterine bird may prove to be an extinct species. Extinct mammals include Euceratherium collinum, Equus species, and Nothrotheriops shasten-sis, all large herbivores. Other than the extinct animals, the fauna dating of the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene is little different from that which is available in southern Arizona today. What appears to have changed is the mosaic of the plant and animal community. Distinctly boreal animals are lacking from the fauna. The climate during the time of deposition of the cave sediment appears to have been equable; certain animals now confined to deserts were able to live in more diverse woodland com-munities. Introduction Deadman Cave is a medium-sized, limestone cave at 1400 m (4600 ft) elevation on the northeastern side of the Santa Catalina Mountains, Pima County, Arizona (Fig. 1). The cave is located in the lower portion of the mountain range where various Paleozoic limestone formations are exposed and it appears to be formed in the Mis-sissippian Escabrosa Formation (Wallace 1955). The present vegetation of this highly dissected area is desert-grassland intermixed with the lower boundary of the oak woodland {Quercus species); juniper {Juniperus erythrocarpa and J. deppeana) is thinly scattered (Whittaker and Niering 1968). Desert-grassland elements such as agave (Agave parryi'), ocotillo {Fouqieria sp/endens), variable prickly pear (Opuntia phaeacantha), and assorted grasses occur on the limestone and conglomerate hillslopes. Tributaries between the hills and the areas of the lower hill-slopes are covered with velvet mesquite {Prosopis velutina), netleaf hackberry (Celt is
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