Re: Cretaceous, yes -- Netherlands, yes -- marsupial, unlikely

[David Marjanovic <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> Thank you for using "Archive",

For many purposes it is the Best On The Web -- in spite of its (inevitable, 
given the size of the project!!!) typos and misunderstandings.

> take the trees persented with a grain of salt... :)

Sure.

> So [...] I should place this critter as a "Ameridelphia incertae sedis"?

Martin et al. put *Maastrichtidelphys* into Herpetotheriidae, and because I 
wouldn't know a herpetotheriid if it bit me, I can't say anything against 
this. The question is where to put Herpetotheriidae. To the best of my 
limited knowledge the two cladograms by Martin et al. are the first that 
have ever included any herpetotheriid.

Ameridelphia has not been thought to be a clade for a long time. For the 
time being the best guess might be:

Metatheria
 |--*Sinodelphys*
 `--+--Deltatheroida
    |--*Marsasia*
    |--*Asiatherium*
    `--+--Peradectidae
       |--Stagodontidae
       |--"Pediomyidae"
       |--Herpetotheriidae
       `--Notometatheria
            |==*Pucadelphys* etc.
            `--+--Sparassodonta
               `--Marsupialia sensu strictissimo

However, there is no single paper that I could cite as a source for this. 
(The description of *Sinodelphys* certainly helps, but it lacks many 
interesting taxa...) There is an SVP meeting abstract that says Pediomyidae 
is paraphyletic, but hardly any details are given...