Zapatoca Explained

Zapatoca
Nickname:Ciudad Levitica (Levitical City
Motto:Libertad y Orden (Liberty and Order)
Settlement Type:Municipality and town
Mapsize:260px
Pushpin Mapsize:300
Pushpin Map Caption:Location in Colombia
Subdivision Type:Country
Subdivision Name: Colombia
Subdivision Type1:Department
Subdivision Name1:Santander Department
Established Date:1682
Area Total Km2:360
Area Total Sq Mi:139
Population Total:8929
Timezone:Colombia Standard Time
Utc Offset:-5
Elevation M:1,720
Elevation Ft:5,500
Website:www.zapatoca-santander.gov.co

Zapatoca (pronounced as /es/) is a town and municipality in the Santander Department in northeastern Colombia. It is at a high altitude and is a common stop between Bucaramanga and San Gil. It was built in the early 17th century by the Spanish conquistadores.

Paleontology

Fossils of Early Cretaceous animals from the Valanginian-Hauterivian Rosablanca Formation were collected near Zapatoca.[1] Fossil material include fishes, particularly pycnodonts and hybodontiform Strophodus, ichthyosaurs, elasmosaurids.[1] Remains of turtles,[1] including Notoemys zapatocaensis,[2] possible ornithocheirid pterosaurs[3] and ammonite Saynoceras verrucosum[2] [3] also known from this location. There is also a report about metriorhynchoid crocodylomorph from these deposits.[1] During the Valanginian and Hauterivian ages, here was a shallow sea where hybodontiforms and pycnodontiforms played an important trophic role as shell-crushing predators.[1]

Notable people

Notes and References

  1. Carrillo-Briceño . Jorge D. . Cadena . Edwin-Alberto . 2022-06-02 . A new hybodontiform shark (Strophodus Agassiz 1838) from the Lower Cretaceous (Valanginian-Hauterivian) of Colombia . PeerJ . en . 10 . e13496 . 10.7717/peerj.13496 . 2167-8359 . 9167585 . 35673391 . free.
  2. Edwin Cadena. 2020. Valanginian occurrence of Pelomedusoides turtles in northern South America: revision of this hypothesis based on a new fossil remain. PeerJ. 8. e9810. 1-12. 10.7717/peerj.9810. free . 32904119 . 7450993 .
  3. Edwin Cadena, David M. Unwin, David M. Martill. 2020. Lower Cretaceous pterosaurs from Colombia. Cretaceous Research. 114. 3. 10.1016/j.cretres.2020.104526. 2020CrRes.11404526C . 224886977 .