4.5-million-year-old freshwater fish fossils discovered in Shivalik foothills near Dehradun

Key facts

• Scientists led by the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology (WIHG) unearthed otoliths of snakehead (Channa sp.), goby (Gobiidae indet.), and gourami (Trichogaster fasciata) in the Shivalik foothills near Mohand, Dehradun.
• The fossils, dated to about 4.5 million years ago, mark the first evidence of aquatic life in a region previously known only for terrestrial animal remains.
• The gourami fossil represents India’s first recorded occurrence and only the second globally after a find in Sumatra, Indonesia.
• Analysis of the otolith assemblage indicates calm, vegetated freshwater bodies existed in the area during the Pliocene epoch.
• Roughly 500 kg of bulk sediments collected in the 2024 field season were processed at the WIHG laboratory to extract the delicate otoliths.
• The peer-reviewed study was published by Springer-Nature in its Palaeobiodiversity and Paleoenvironments journal on 31 March.