Chasicotherium

Chasicotherium Temporal range: late Miocene
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	†Notoungulata
Suborder:	†Toxodonta
Family:	†Homalodotheriidae
Genus:	†Chasicotherium Cabrera & Kraglievich, 1931
Species:	†C. rothi
Binomial name
†Chasicotherium rothi Ameghino, 1887

Chasicotherium rothi was a large notoungulate discovered in the Chasico Formation, in the stream homónimo of the Party of Villarino, Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The sediments in which the animal remains were discovered have an antiquity between 10 and 9 million years. It was an herbivore that preferred dry and open atmospheres. Like Toxodon and Trigodon, certain similarities to the hippopotamus and rhinoceros exists in its build, but there is no special relationship to either animal. This phenomenon may be an example of “adaptive convergence” or “parallel evolution”, which is to say, species that are unrelated to each other evolve similarities through adapting to very similar environments and occupying equivalent ecological niches. Most notable of Chasicotherium was its trait that, instead of having ungulates' phalanges or hooves in his legs, it had robust claws. Its weight was approximately one ton. It was a great herbivore of the Tertiary Pampas.