Urrr.... is it true that French Archaeopteryx has ranid, rather than dromaeosaurid claw morphology?

Here's another great deal!!! Archaeopteryx fossil.

http://cgi.ebay.com/veritable-of-archaeopteryx-skeleton-fossil-Jurassic_W0QQitemZ6604241244QQcategoryZ3 214QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Here's another great deal!!! Archaeopteryx fossil.

http://cgi.ebay.com/veritable-of-archaeopteryx-skeleton-fossil-Jurassic_W0QQitemZ6604241244QQcategoryZ3 214QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
Can you say "What do we do with all these bird-flu infected chickens?"

:lol:

Link turned into veritable of tortoise by now, reverse evolution? :grin:

How did that happen???

Urrrr, .., you tell me?!

An absolutely astounding find announced today that will really shake up our view of early mammal evolution.

Jurassic 'Beaver' (http://www.newscientist.com/channel/life/dn8769.html)

I know it's a Chinese find, but it's also covered in Science, what to think now? Do platypus suffer from bird flu?

A bit off topic, but I suspect of interest to some of you out there:

http://www.discover.com/issues/mar-06/cover/

and going even a bit more off topic, this reminds me of the potential cancer cures using viruses that don't impact healthy cells, but take advantage of the cancer cells screwed-up-ness and kill them, so if you inject the virus into certain types of tumors, it selectively kills the tumor cells but doesn't infect the healthy ones... I think that's just way cool...

Help!

These are two blocks containing Carboniferous plant fossils that were taken from rocks mined out from the local Kent coalfields, long since closed. I've had these for many years but decided to have a look at them again the other day. There are two structures in them that I am baffled by, would anyone have any idea what they are?

On the right of the first specimen is a loop structure which I've made a close up of. I wondered if this was part of a leaf, but I'm not sure that leaves were oval in shape in that period. Also there is an apparant segmentation patern that just doesn't look right for a leaf, somehow.

The second fossil has a round striated structure that looks a little like a gall. I'm can probably provide more pictures if anyone would like to see them.

Thanks!

Not a clue on the first fossil Phil. Maybe a long segmented worm or millipede :oops: ) The second looks a lot like a distorted stem of Calamites.

Phil you lucky devil - thats a lovely millipede! Look at the bottom right hand side of if it and you can even see traces of what look like spines so it could be a Euphoberiid - Carboniferous millipedes are a fairly obscure subject so I might be wrong on the id. If you want something more precise try Lyall Anderson at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. (he'll probably point out its a cross section of a calamites node and I'll have to hand in my Carboniferous collectors card in shame :oops: ). I've attached a couple of mine for comparison. Millis in the coal measures are frequently found looped like that, sometimes forming a complete circle.

The leaves at the top left of the same block are either Annularia or Sphenophyllum - I'd probably plump for the former. Kevin is right with your third pic, its a distorted calamites.

Do you have the other side of the slab aswell?

Andy

hey guys
i have some leedsichthys bones would you like to see ?

Wow, thanks chaps! Calamites and a millipede? I am very happy with the millipede ID, I will try and get a photo or two in better detail of the spines tomorrow and post them on here. Thanks also for the pointers on the other plants Andy. Unfortunately I do not have the counterpart of the specimen. It does look as if most of the specimen is an impression of the millipede excepting the very tip which seems to consist of a few segments of the body itself.

Knowing practically nothing about millipedes, would you happen to know if this is a particularly rare find? Thanks for the pictures of yours too, lovely specimens.

From your post I've had a hunt around for Dr Anderson on the net and found he has his own 'Fossil Surgery' website in which he encourages people to send in photos for identification. I might try and forward him a couple of pictures to see if he can confirm the Euphoberiid ID.


Fossilkid

Sure - post away. My only request is that you post them in this thread as most TONMO fossil threads, aside from this one, are dedicated to cephalopod fossils and are not really for general fossil pics. Well as TONMO is a ceph site, that's only appropriate really.

Hi Phil

Yes, Millipedes are rare finds. This is not necessarily because they are intrinsically rare themselves - in Upper Carboniferous arthropod bearing sites they usually make up one of the more numerous elements of the fauna but such sites are few and far between. This is because the horizons where the preservation is good enough to record them are both few in number and narrow in depth and often of limited lateral extent and natural exposures rare. You have to rely on temporary exposures such as opencasts or mine dumps. Then you have to realise that not many people are out looking for them so many that are uncovered will erode away or get buried again. In the Lancashire coal field I know of 5 seperate sites where they were found, 2 of these were identified in the early 1900's and the other 3 all turned up in the 1990's. Given the number of coal mines that operated during the period I'm sure this is more to do with interested parties getting out and looking for them rather than an actual scarcity of sites. That having been said, even when they do turn up they are not exactly what you'd call common when taking the whole fossil content into account. At the site I've collected from I'd guess around 100 were found preserved in siderite nodules like mine but we didn't find any in the mudstone itself. In the same period literally thousands of plant bearing nodules and mudstone blocks were uncovered. That's with about 5 people collecting twice a week with a 3 hour stay each visit for 5 years - roughly 1 millipede for every 78 man hours of collecting. Yep' they're rare!

Andy

Andy,

Very interesting your comments about dumps from coal mines. As you may remember, out at Pegwell Bay near Ramsgate there used to be a hovercraft company, Seaspeed I think, that used to operate trips to France over twenty years ago. The foundation of the concrete apron that those enormous machines stopped on was composed of slabs of rock taken from the Kent coalmines. I've heard that now the apron is being slowly weathered away, plant fossils can be found poking through gaps in the concrete. Quite an unusual exposure, to say the least.

Thanks again for the information, I've e-mailed Dr Anderson as you have suggested, hopefully he'll have a look at it and confirm the identification. I hope so, I'll be chuffed to bits if it is a spiny millipede!

In the meantime, here's a couple of close ups of the spines I took this morning.

http://www.tonmo.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2232&d=1142862792

http://www.tonmo.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2233&d=1142862792

http://www.tonmo.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2234&d=1142862792

(he'll probably point out its a cross section of a calamites node and I'll have to hand in my Carboniferous collectors card in shame :oops: )

Andy, where do you get one of these cards, looks like I need to hand mine in before I even get it. :oops:

WTG Phillipo ! & cheers to Andy for his erudite insight into the world of the UK's Carboniferous millipede hunters !

Went to a fossil & mineral show in Nantes on Saturday expecting to see mountains of this regions ammonite specimens only to find Madagasca & Morocco outnumbered the locals about 5000:1 :sad: , hopefully the next effort in Thouars, capital of the Toarcien, will put up a better fight, though I did have a pleasant chinwag with a nice Moroccan chap on the production of those polished Devonian limestone dinner plates :sun: Ebayers will know well !

Keef

I'm still fairly confident of it being a milli Phil (please let it be a milli now I've stuck my neck out :goofysca:) Euphoberia philensis?

Kevin, in order to get you carboniferous collectors card you need to spend several years wading through thick mud in the bottom of a deep hole, clonk your thumb with a lump hammer at least 10 times and repeat the mantra "......(insert the oath of your choice here) - another bit of wood" for 99 nodules out of 100.

Andy

spend several years wading through thick mud in the bottom of a deep hole, clonk your thumb with a lump hammer at least 10 times and repeat the mantra "......(insert the oath of your choice here) - another bit of wood" for 99 nodules out of 100.

Andy

That looks like alot of fun, think I'll start now :grin:

My fingers are crossed Phil.

Chaps,

I need to track down this article:

BURKE, J. J. 1979. A new millipede genus, Myriacantherpestes (Diplopoda, Archipolypoda) and a new species, Myriacantherpestes bradebirksi, from the English Coal Measures. Kirtlandia, 30:1-24.

If anyone could help with this, I'd very much appreciate it.

I have managed to obtain a photo of a few body rings of Myriacanthepestes which display lateral spines, and it does indeed bear a close resemblance. Problem is, only the sub-dorsal spines (?) are visible in my specimen, so I can't compare the length to say whether this is the same genus, or the same species. This was a large Upper Carboniferous spinous millipede that is the closest match I can find. We really need an expert opinion on this beast.

For interest, here's a cleaned up version of the 'head' area with a suggestion of some of the features visible, and a clearer picture of the spines.

(Thanks for your help with this Andy!:grin: I just hope I don't up with egg on my face over it, as usual!)

Here is link to the Cleveland Museum of Natural History that publishes Kirtlandia... Looks like you will have to pay for the article...
http://www.cmnh.org/collections/library/kirtlandia.html

Jennifer,

Thanks very much for that link. I'll try e-mailing them tomorrow and I'll let you know how I get on.

Cheers!

Hi folks

Here are a couple of calamites masquerading as millipedes. The first one is a cross section through a 3d pith cast, the second a branch scar - not the best of examples but the only one I could find in the drawers.

Andy

Here are a couple of calamites masquerading as millipedes.



Thanks Andy.

I have a disappointing feeling that this may be how the interpretation of fossil will finally pan out, especially given the similarity of the first picture. Still, I'm awaiting for an expert opinion, one specialist has been 50:50, another hinting at 'unlikely' but is still studying the pictures. Two other invertebrate palaeo-graduates have been much more positive in the millipede identity, though they admit that it's not really their area of expertise.

It's those spines that seem to radiate regularly from each 'trunk ring' that bug me. They are very regular, and surely a horsetail (cross section) would not have such structures, whatever they are?

The goat and chicken-entrails are casting gloomy omens.:cry:

(Apologies if I'm becoming a little repetitive here).

Hi Phil

It does look that way doesn't it. The more detailed the pictures I see the less I'm certain of my original millipede enthusiasm. It is an odd object though. The first of my milli look alikes is a pith cast of a verticle truck section whereas yours is on a mudstone surface and doesn't appear to be a cast running through the rock. The second of my pics shows the surface of the trunk with a branch scar whereas yours shows no indication of it being a calamites impression other than the mystery ring section itself. Don't know what the spines could be in terms of calamites structure.

Andy

The middle pic (M1.JPG) on post #216 shows the "bark" of the Calamites branch to the right of the node (spines, interrupted by a fissure or crack, and continuing another 20mm or so). Just like the distorted Calamites cast except the left section is missing. I remember as a kid pulling horsetails apart by sections and sticking them back together making long chains.
Sorry Phil :sad: but I think we are beating a dead horsetail.:roll:

I have handed my Collectors card in and it has been revoked!:oops:

:lol: :lol: Oh that's excellent Andy.

I know what you mean, it's times like this that make me think I should resign as fossils moderator as I really don't know what I'm talking about. Any volunteers? :sad:

Utter nonsense. Are you drunk, my friend?

You guys are giving up way to easy!

At least it wasnt a weird shaped rock on Mars that we were thinking was a squid. :wink:

we all know the rock on mars was elvis......

I thought it was Neil Diamond... 8-)

http://science.slashdot.org/science/06/04/08/1749225.shtml

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/07/science/07evolve.html

kinda cool, although I wish the article focused more on the science than on "yadda yadda evolution vs illegitimate design"

as long as I'm mentioning stuff that might be of interest, this is about primate vision, but I thought it was interesting, anyway; given the recent discussions about ceph color vision and such, I thought people might be interested in a color vision theory... and it does show that old world primates like us have a "pure visual communication channel" like the cephs' primary social communication. :oops:
http://pr.caltech.edu/media/Press_Releases/PR12802.html

this is a very interesting (albeit somewhat hypothetical) article on how early life might have moved from using RNA as both genome and catalysts to RNA+Proteins to DNA+Proteins, with a lot of emphasis on how the development of a ribosome can be explained without inexplicable leaps, in particular the 3-base-pair codes for amino acids...

http://awcmee.massey.ac.nz/people/dpenny/pdf/Penny_2005b.pdf

Look what I found on ebay! It must be some missing link between ancient fossil turtles and modern turtles! Notice how the ribs have not yet fused to become the shell. :grin:

I should make a few of those handprint in plaster fossils I used to make in grade school and see how much I could get for them on ebay. :grin:

Monty... I wish there was a emoticon that showed something going way over my head. :oops:

Monty... I wish there was a emoticon that showed something going way over my head. :oops:

Yeah, I wish that a lot, too...

http://science.slashdot.org/science/06/04/20/009215.shtml

I am not sure how having a sacrum proves that they evolved on land. Didn't the ancestor of whales (some cow/pig thing) return to the sea?

I am not sure how having a sacrum proves that they evolved on land. Didn't the ancestor of whales (some cow/pig thing) return to the sea?

Yup, and this (http://www.plesiosauria.com/occitanosaurus.html) suggests plesiosaurs had sacra (sacrums?) too... maybe there's something about the geometry that shows it supported weight on its feet? Dunno... good questions. I didn't try to look up the actual paper...

My understanding is that the environment in which the animal lived is thought to be terrestrial. Don't ask me 'bout no taphonomy, though. The sacrum shows that it is an early snake, supposedly earlier than all the other sacrum-less fossils. I should probably skim the piece in Nature...

For $1.99 you can have your own T-Rex...http://cgi.ebay.com/chinese-old-historied-dinosaur-fossil_W0QQitemZ6623750854QQcategoryZ159 15QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem#ebayphotohosting

Originally posted in Nature
So, if the earliest known snake lived on land, that suggests snakes evolved on land, Zaher said.

I think I understand now. Since they found this "oldest snake" fossil and it was discovered in a terrestrial environment, then snakes must have started out on land. What happens when they find an older sea-based snake fossil in the future?

This link discusses vistigial legs in whale fossils. This seems kind of analagous to the sacrum in snakes (at least in MY mind:hmm: ).

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=0007F0DF-DD6D-1C67-B882809EC588ED9F

Anyone looking for a dinosaur bone to add to their collections? Shipping is free to the UK...
http://cgi.ebay.com/Triceratops-Scapula-Large-Dinosaur-Fossil-Bone-NR_W0QQitemZ6633714664QQihZ012QQcategory Z15915QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

A thousand dollars for a lone trike scapula. A fool and his money...

Dan

he's got his hair on upside down !

Keef

Huh, that's better...

Oh dear.

This thread was supposed to be semi-serious. Oh well, when in Rome.

A one-off mind.

It's your thread, and you started it... :tongue: Besides how could you be serious looking at that guy??? He's just asking to be photo-shopped.

He's just asking to be photo-shopped.

You can't argue with that! :wink:

Ok,

Back to fossils...
http://cgi.ebay.com/Fossils-HUGE-MUSEUM-RARE-TRILOBITE-NEST-BURROW-Fossil_W0QQitemZ6633794585QQihZ012QQcate goryZ3217QQcmdZViewItem

Is this really a trace fossil from a trilobite?

Phil, can you rotate face so we can see what he looked like in his prime ? I'm quite interested as he looks a bit like an ex (female, let's get THAT clear)

Keef

:goofysca: :shock:

at least I'm being honest & up front

Keef

I'm quite interested as he looks a bit like an ex (female, let's get THAT clear)

Keef,

Was her name Tri-sarahtops by any chance?

:lol: My daughter has always said that Triceratops is her favorite dinosaur, because it has her name in it...

:lol: My daughter has always said that Triceratops is her favorite dinosaur, because it has her name in it...

Is your daughter Condoleezza Rice? :)

Is this really a trace fossil from a trilobite?

Hi ya,

Yes, I imagine it probably is just that. If you look at the lozenge shape you can see that it is scored with a median line with what appear to be sweeping brush strokes either side. Those would have been where the legs of the trilobite would have brushed along as it dug a tunnel, the line cleaving the tunnel in two being the centre line of the animal.

Have a look at this for further proof, scroll down the page to halfway and look at the pictures:

http://www.uky.edu/OtherOrgs/KPS/pages/research.html

Keef,

Was her name Tri-sarahtops by any chance?

:lol: like it like it :lol:

Trace fossils usually require you to install a 3D, back to front brain, only then do things start to make sense (ish) !

Keef

saw this and thought of you guys....

http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/053006/ornithosuchidae.gif

Ichthyosaur Arctic migration route revealed.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1153173011767&call_pageid=968332188774&col=968350116467

Where do you find those nautilus avatars?

Where do you find those nautilus avatars?

Do you mean the smilies? If so, I drew most of the fossil ones for this site, um... turned them into transparencies and Tony posted them.

:shock:

Hot Pterosaur Crest Action (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5221862.stm)

Say, I wonder whatever happened with that U2-sized pterosaur people were whispering about...:silenced:

Clem

? confused... U2... like as in the band...is it supposed to be a joke...

? confused... U2... like as in the band...is it supposed to be a joke...
Hello KatiE,

Oooohhh, makin' me feel real old, KatiE.

Before U2 was an Irish band I won't hear a word against, it was an infamous spyplane designed and built by Lockheed of California. The Lockheed U-2 was basically a glider with a jet engine buried in the tail, designed to fly high and slow whilst taking pictures of Russia for the CIA. An American U-2 was shot down over Sverdlosk, U.S.S.R in May, 1960, sparking a major diplomatic incident.

Anyhow, there've been rumors of a pterosaur with a truly massive wingspan, so...

Cheers,
Clem

A U-2 is also an aircraft that predates the band by a couple decades.

edit: Ah, Clem beat me to it.

Wow neat...lol it's my job to make you feel old ;) just kidding!

You're very good at your job... sigh...

Please find herewith pics of said spyplane and some terrific shots from its cockpit at 30 Km's + up, talk about a view...

technically it's a TR-1, but it's still a U2 to me :wink:

And now :coffee:

Here's an interesting find in the news today. A 25m year old baleen whale with teeth. Yep, you heard right.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4797679.stm

Awesome!

Very cool. I've had a though bouncing around in my head for years that it's weird that the filter-feeding cetaceans are smart, since it's usually the case that the main selection pressure for intelligence is active hunting... so perhaps they evolved to be smart, then they evolved to be filter feeders (by realizing they could be smart and lazy). Of course, it's also possible that being smart enough to find schools of krill strategically is to their advantage, too... And there's probably not too much pressure to lose intelligence once you have it (although modern human development sometimes makes me wonder...)

Interesting thoughts there Monty, as ever.

I wonder when and when the earliest baleen plates are known from? I've also found it interesting that the larged toothed whales are so outnumbered by their baleen plated cousins. After all, squid are found all over the world in huge numbers and one might not unreasonably expect that more species of whale might have evolved to exploit this.

Maybe I'm just not thinking this through, but it is 3:15am!

... And there's probably not too much pressure to lose intelligence once you have it (although modern human development sometimes makes me wonder...)

:lol: I could start naming names and keep on going for a week!

I know it's one of those nasty vertebrates, but this is interesting nonetheless:

http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/10/fossil_fish_fills_evolutionary.php

Not cephs, but there's a whole issue of Science (http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol314/issue5801/index.dtl) on sea urchin genetics. Or see the Reuters summary article (http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=scienceNews&storyID=2006-11-09T195029Z_01_N09386018_RTRUKOC_0_US-SCIENCE-URCHIN.xml&WTmodLoc=SciNewsHome_C2_scienceNews-1)...

Some might remember this from a post some time ago - back in 2004 I found this eye popping beastie in my local opencast coal mine. Was pottering about one sunday morning when I noticed a likely looking nodule had dropped from a block of mudstone that had been sitting on the tips for weeks. Thinking it might contain a nice fern or cone I gave it a tap and was gobsmacked by what appeared. Its now been described and not only is it a new species its a new genus! Anglopterum magnificum or Englands Magnificent Wing if my latin is correct. The paper "New homoiopterids from the Late Carboniferous of England (Insecta:Palaeodictyoptera)" is available on the web as a pdf file - google "Crock Hey" and it should be one of the first things to pop up. We're talking about a fly with a wingspan of about 30cm here. I am somewhat chuffed!

Andy

Cool Andy,
Are both halves the holotype? In the article it says "in half a concretion".

That thing must have been looking for one big pile of .......

8-)

I think technically only the right hand half is the holotype - I wasn't involved in the write up and was never asked for any more photos

Magnificent Andy ! 8-)
The wing not you !:grin:
Keef

And here was me thinking my fame had spread Keef!:grin:

Did you have to give the holotype to some museum or something, or were you allowed to keep it? I don't know how that sort of stuff works...

From the link in this thread (http://www.tonmo.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8061)

"One of the main requirements in naming a fossil is that it has to be held in a museum or institution."

So I assume that Andy gave half of the concretion (the Holotype) to a museum or institution and got to keep the other half.

At the moment they both reside with me but will at some point be finding their way to an institution (having too much fun showing and telling at the moment). I've sent a latex mould to one of the authors of the paper. Actually I didn't come under any pressure to give them up which I think is a good thing really - far better to have new finds brought to the attention of the scientific community by finders who don't feel an obligation to hand them over than to have things hidden away unknown for fear of being expected to give them up - thats my opinion anyway.

You're lucky its not a vertebrate--no journal would touch it unless it made its way into a museum or public collection.

50 my old Spider CT scan (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071029083230.htm), if only they could find that elusive arboreal ammonoid preserved in amber:cyclops:

The spider is facinating but the technology - wow!

We can find 500my old Jellyfish (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071030211210.htm), but we cant find ammonoid soft parts. Whats wrong with this picture? :shock:

Maybe cephs can swim away from pine tree sap? Of today's jelly's I think only that awful thing in New Zeland can swim (great special on the box jelly on the TV the other night, Neal no longer wants to dive anywhere south of the equator).

Maybe cephs can swim away from pine tree sap? Of today's jelly's I think only that awful thing in New Zeland can swim (great special on the box jelly on the TV the other night, Neal no longer wants to dive anywhere south of the equator).

Don't tell Neal that there are box jellies in Hawai'i...

According to this (http://www.aloha.com/~lifeguards/jelyfish.html) they're the "really hurts and might cause anaphylaxis" box jellies rather than the "can easily kill humans, allergic or not" kind in Hawaii, at least...

I was kayaking in Sausalito among some 6-8 inch moon jellies last weekend, but I didn't have a camera.

According to this (http://www.aloha.com/~lifeguards/jelyfish.html) they're the "really hurts and might cause anaphylaxis" box jellies rather than the "can easily kill humans, allergic or not" kind in Hawaii, at least...

I was kayaking in Sausalito among some 6-8 inch moon jellies last weekend, but I didn't have a camera.

That's true, I used to see them when I worked in Waikiki at the Natatorium, an old salt water swimming pool. I never encountered them personally though...

I wish I had written down the name (and channel) of that special - 300 pound jelly fish anyone?

After seeing the moon jellies at our new aquarium we looked into keeping some kind of jelly fish in our 4' tall but only 1' diameter 30 gallon tank. It only took a few minutes of study to kill the idea though. I even asked Ken about getting us the "upside down" jellies that are often seen in the shallows in the keys. He made it very clear that they were "nasty", killed everything where they took up residence and would ruin the tank for other creatures even after they expired, which would not be long after putting them in the tank.

Damn, the aquariums make jellies look so easy to keep! Oh well, I can't have a any tank at all until I have more time at home.

Maybe this is what giant ammonites ate... :goofysca: I knew eurypterids got big, but not this big...

http://http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/news.asp?id=7282 (http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/news.asp?id=7282)

Very Cool! 8-)

Yeah, that's freaky. Here's another article (http://www6.comcast.net/news/articles/general/2007/11/21/Biggest.Bug.Ever/?cvqh=itn_bugfossil). I wonder how many london buses that is?

:bus:

What a stunning find. Those barbs and hooks on the claws look really vicious.

This many buses Tony?

From today's news, word of a recently uncovered (and spectacular sounding) hadrosaur "mummy" from North Dakota, (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/02/AR2007120202280.html?nav=rss_email/components) with obligatory pooh-poohing by Jack Horner at his condescending worst. The finder of the fossil is a student of paleontology at Yale. Talk about making one's bones...

Clem