Amphitheatre Cave
Basic information
Sample name: Amphitheatre Cave

Sample aka: Colliver's Cave

Reference: R. F. Baird. 1992. Fossil avian assemblage of pitfall origin from Holocene sediments in Amphitheatre Cave (G-2), south-western Victoria, Australia. Records of the Australian Museum 44(1):21-44 [ER 3707]
Geography
Country: Australia

State: Victoria


Coordinate: 38° 3' S, 141° 1' E
Coordinate basis: stated in text

Time interval: Holocene

Ma: 0.00467

Age basis: radiocarbon (uncalibrated)

Geography comments: "Amphitheatre Cave (G-2) is located approximately 6 km north of the township of Nelson, south-western Victoria, in the central part of an easterly facing cliff, approximately 15 m above the Glenelg River".
The deposit is Holocene in age. A radiocarbon date of 4,670 ± 90 B.P. was obtained on a tibiotarsus of Gallinula mortierii".

Environment
Lithology: not described

Taphonomic context: cave,pitfall trap

Habitat comments: "The cave has three entrances to a high bifurcating joint controlled passage 80 m long and 18 m deep. The main chamber has a large aven. Two entrances are joint enlargements in the cliff face 15 m above river level, while the third entrance is an enlarged solution tube 30 m deep x 1.5 m diameter".
"Most of the material seems to have originated from a pitfall accumulation, based upon the large percentage of individuals and species with elements lacking the damage characteristic of vertebrate accumulators".

Methods
Life forms: bats,rodents,other large mammals,other small mammals,birds

Sampling methods: quarry

Sample size: 7346 specimens

Sampling comments: "The excavation was started by F.S. Colliver on April 20-21 1935, and completed over three subsequent trips".
"The material was collected by bringing handfuls of the flour [sediment within the cave] at a time and spreading it on the surface within a daylight area, and picking out any small bones, jaws or individual teeth that appeared. The bigger bones were felt within the flour and gently eased out".
The mammalian species and counts registered below correspond to the identified remains that were collected from the site and are now held at the Melbourne Museum. This data was recorded during a collections visit on 17 March 2022. The avian remains were obtained from the reference paper (Baird 1992).

Metadata
Sample number: 3921

Contributor: Benjamin Carter

Enterer: Benjamin Carter

Created: 2022-03-21 14:23:38

Modified: 2022-03-21 03:25:07

Abundance distribution
58 species
16 singletons
total count 7346
geometric series index: 94.3
Fisher's α: 8.589
geometric series k: 0.8746
Hurlbert's PIE: 0.8383
Shannon's H: 2.2532
Good's u: 0.9978
Each square represents a species. Square sizes are proportional to counts.
Register
Rattus fuscipes greyi1644
also 394 Rattus sp.
Pseudomys novaehollandiae610
Antechinus swainsonii5
Sarcophilus harrisii17.5 kg
Vespadelus pumilus14.4 g insectivore
"Eptesicus pumilus"
Pseudomys auritus3
also 750 Pseudomys sp.
Miniopterus schreibersii28312.4 g insectivore
Antechinus flavipes6
Antechinus stuartii4
also 15 Antechinus sp.
Myotis adversus2310.4 g insectivore
Falsistrellus tasmaniensis1 insectivore
"Pipistrellus tasmaniensis"
Pipistrellus sp.5
Chalinolobus gouldii313.3 g insectivore
Nyctophilus geoffroyi238.3 g insectivore
Nyctophilus corbeni2
"Nyctophilus timoriensis"
Acrobates sp.447
Conilurus albipes110
also 8 Conilurus sp.
Cercartetus nanus207418.9 g
also 1 Cercartetus sp.
Pseudocheirus peregrinus244
Mastacomys fuscus923
also 84 Mastacomys sp.
Perameles sp.101
likely P. gunnii
Isoodon obesulus1661.0 kg
also 2 Isoodon sp. and 34 Peramelidae indet.
Wallabia 'bicolor'12
Bettongia gaimardi1
Vombatus ursinus129 kg
Potorous tridactylus8731 g
also 41 Potorous sp.
Trichosurus vulpecula922.1 kg folivore
Notamacropus rufogriseus1114 kg
"Wallabia rufogrisea"
Dasyurus maculatus1
Thylogale billardierii125.1 kg
Petaurus breviceps1
Eudyptula minor55.9 g
Pachyptila sp.1
Phalacrocorax sp.2
Accipiter fasciatus115.1 g carnivore-insectivore
Falco cenchroides112.9 g carnivore
Coturnix sp.14
Turnix varius2174.7 g
Hypotaenidia philippensis12
"Rallus philippensis"
Tribonyx mortierii297
"Gallinula mortierii"
Chroicocephalus novaehollandiae1
"Larus novaehollandiae"
Phaps chalcoptera1344 g granivore
Phaps elegans1219 g granivore
Glossopsitta concinna28.1 g nectarivore
Cacatua tenuirostris1588 g
Eolophus roseicapilla26.6 g granivore
"Cacatua roseicapilla"
Platycercus elegans85.1 g frugivore-omnivore
Neophema sp.2
Cinclosoma punctatum10120 g
Dasyornis brachypterus2741.8 g
Dasyornis broadbenti8867.9 g
Anthochaera carunculata9 nectarivore
Anthochaera chrysoptera1 nectarivore
Ptilonorhynchus violaceus6 frugivore
Corvus sp.4
Anatidae indet.2
Hirundinidae indet.8
Cracticinae indet.1