Paleontology in Florida

Paleontology in Florida refers to paleontological research occurring within or conducted by people from the U.S. state of Florida. Florida has a very rich fossil record spanning from the Eocene to recent times. Florida fossils are often very well preserved.

The oldest known fossils in Florida date back to the Eocene. At this time Florida was covered in a sea home to a variety of marine invertebrates and the primitive whales, such as Basilosaurus. During the later Miocene Florida was exposed as dry land again due to geologic uplift and mountain building. In the Florida Keys, however, coral reefs were forming. The marine environments of Pliocene Florida were home to creatures like dugongs, porpoises, sharks, and whales. On land, camels, dogs, horses, relatives of modern elephants, saber toothed cats, enteleodonts (hell pigs), and tapirs inhabited the state. The period of time best documented in the fossil record of Florida is the Pleistocene epoch. Among them were short-faced bears, saber-toothed cats, glyptodonts, mammoths, mastodons, giant ground sloths, and dire wolves.

Florida's state paleontological repository is housed at the University of Florida's Florida Museum of Natural History.

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