The Las Hoyas Lagerstätte: a palaeontological view of an Early Cretaceous wetland

Abstract

Las Hoyas (Cuenca, Spain) represents a unique Early Cretaceous (Barremian) fossil biota of a wetland. The site has yielded a particularly diverse assemblage of >20 000 plant and animal fossils, many of which present unprecedented soft tissue preservation, including microstructural details. Among the most significant discoveries are the oldest angiosperms, the smallest species of chondrichtians and squamates, new theropod dinosaurs, including several enantiornithine birds, the first European tapejarid pterosaur and the most complete eutriconodont mammal. Such discoveries have produced data on important aspects related to plant and animal evolution, such as the first steps in flower development by plants, insights into unknown anatomical and diet specializations in theropod dinosaurs, the development of flight manoeuvrability in early birds, the unexpected global distribution of tapejarid dinosaurs and ground-breaking data on early mammalian hair development. There are many more discoveries to unveil and new research is now linking the immense wealth of palaeobiological information with mathematical procedures to study the ecological structure of the wetland.