Otekaikea is an extinct genus of toothed whale closely related to Waipatia. It is known from the late Oligocene (Chattian) of New Zealand.
Otekaikea is an extinct genus of toothed whale closely related to Waipatia. It is known from the late Oligocene (Chattian) of New Zealand.
==Description== thumb|left|Reconstructed skull of O. marplesi Otekaikea is a medium-sized odontocete similar to Waipatia in the following characters: maxilla and occipital partly separated by parietal; flat dorsal surface of periotic; long posterior process of the periotic; and poorly developed ventromedial keel of the bulla. Differences from other archaic odontocetes include: broad dished face; elevated nodular subrhomboidal nasals and elevated frontals; smooth-surfaced premaxillary sac fossae without prominent premaxillary sulci developed posteriorly; premaxillae strongly bifurcated posteriorly, associated with bilateral posterior accessory foramina and elevated crests on the maxillae; periotic with long slender parallel-sided posterior process, and sharp apex of anterior process.
Discovered by embedding cosine similarity (sentence-transformers MiniLM, 384-dim).