Latest Ordovician and earliest Silurian tabulate corals of South China

Latest Ordovician and earliest Silurian tabulate corals of the South China paleoplate are summarized at the generic level. In contrast to the abundant late Katian records, there is no record of tabulate corals in the early–middle Hirnantian rocks in South China, lithostratigraphically represented by the Kuanyinchiao Formation and its equivalents. The tabulate fauna from the late Hirnantian and the earliest Silurian rocks of South China is characterized by the occurrence of three cosmopolitan genera: Paleofavosites, Propora and Halysites. They differ morphologically from the pre-Hirnantian tabulate corals of South China. Such a long-ranging and low-diversity tabulate coral fauna also indicates a warm but somewhat unfavorable living environment during the survival interval after the second pulse of the end-Ordovician mass extinction.