Vyazniki Biotic Assemblage of the Terminal Permian

A. G. Sennikov1 Contact Information and V. K. Golubev1 Contact Information
(1) Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences,
Profsoyuznaya ul. 123, Moscow, 117997, Russia

Received: 30 January 2006

Abstract A new unique and diverse biotic assemblage of the terminal Permian has recently been discovered in the town of Vyazniki (Central Russia). The Vyazniki terrestrial community is transitional between Permian and Triassic ones and represents the last, so far unknown stage of the global ecological crisis of the continental biota at the Permian-Triassic boundary. The successive development of land biotic crisis in the Late Permian, which was followed by mass extinction at the Permian-Triassic boundary, and long, successive postcrisis development and specialization of new Triassic groups as well as rearrangement and diversification of the biotic assemblage composition and community structure suggest predominance of intrinsic, biotic causes of this crisis, realized in destabilization, alteration, and new stabilization of continental communities and ecosystems.

The authors interpret that the Vyazniki Biotic Assemblage as an example of the transition from Permian to Triassic faunas or in the very least a post gorgonopsid-pareiasaur assemblage. That may be true, but I suspect that this may be a case of a local fauna only that may have spread as the opportunity presented itself. It may represent a refugium too.

They also suggest that Russia may have a contiguous Upper Permian to Lower Triassic geological set of stages.

More later.