Adam's Early / Lower Devonian

[Tidgy's Dad]

An even bigger spriferid is this slightly battered, but rather impressive Costispirifer arenosus.

It's 5.5 cm wide and has already appeared on the forum in one of @Misha's threads posting about his Glenerie Formation finds. 

Note that it has many smooth ribs packed quite closely together and a high fold. 

A bit broken, but still very nice.

[Tidgy's Dad]

I managed to prise some of the matrix off the reverse of the bigger Glenerie spiriferids  shown in the previous couple of posts.

This chunk has two brachiopods stuck together, the first of them being another spiriferid, the almost smooth-shelled Spirinella modesta. 

1.3 cm wide. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

I found another couple of smaller Spirinella modesta that I managed to get mostly free of the matrix. The little one was on the Acrospirifer, the bigger one was sent loose, but I have removed as much matrix that was covering it as possible without damaging it too much.  

The bigger one is 9 mm wide.

Here's the big one: 

Nice detail of the pedicle valve interior:

 

Edited October 11, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

Here's the smaller Spirinella modesta, 6.5 mm wide.

[Tidgy's Dad]

Whilst Leptocoelia was transferred from Atrypida to Rhynchonellida, Coelospira was moved from Atrypida to Athyridida. Which leaves not a lot in the way of atrypids in the Glenerie.

 

Coelospira dichotoma seems to be one of the more common brachiopods found in the formation. It occurs in quite a range of sizes.

I think that these two tiny specimens are juvenile C. dichotoma, I'll post a couple of mature specimens in the next post.

This first example is stuck in matrix inside of a valve of a much larger specimen of the same species which is itself stuck to an even larger Acrospirifer murchisoni. Note that the little Coelospira has a couple of quite noticeable growth lines. Interestingly, adult specimens don't exhibit further noticeable growth lines so these only show near the anterior margin of the shell in larger examples of the species..  

The specimen is 6mm across.

No fold or sulcus evident but maybe a slight curve near the centre of the commissure.

This second one is broken and came out of the matrix under the same spiriferid. It is 7 mm wide.

I am not certain about the IDs for these, so if anyone has a better suggestion,

I

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

Here are a couple of larger Glenerie Coelospira dichotoma.

This first one is in the matrix with my Acrospirifer murchisoni and has a little one from the last post on the inside of it.

It is 1.9 cm wide.

Quite a hooked beak.

The second one is in the matrix stuck to my Costispirifer arenosus.

It is 1.3 mm wide.

[Tidgy's Dad]

The Athyridida is also represented by a couple of species of Meristella in the Glenerie. This genus seems to occur in most of the Early Devonian formations in the USA., often more than one species present.

This one came to me already loose from @Misha, I just tidied it up a little bit.

It is Meristella lata, more rounded and long than the wider-than-long species M. lentiformis.

This lovely specimen is 13 mm wide.

This second specimen I picked out of the matrix on the reverse of the Acrospirifer murchisoni and is next to a Spirinella modesta that I posted earlier.

This one is 1.6 mm wide.

 

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

The second species of Merstella present in the Glenerie Formation is Meristella lentiformis.

This species is usually quite a bit wider than it is long and generally smaller than Meristella lata.

I dug this specimen out of the matrix under the Acrospirifer murchisoni, a bit damaged and covered in nasty hard stuff, but Im quite happy with it if not my photos which I really should do again.

It is 11 mm wide,

[Tidgy's Dad]

Despite the order Spriferinida being separated from Spiriferida back in 1994,  they are still almost always referred to as spiriferids on this forum.  

There are many differences between the two orders. For example, spiriferinids have a punctate shell whilst spiriferids are always impunctate, spiriferinids usually have a higher interarea (cardinal area) and had a functioning pedicle to anchor the shell, while spiriferids had no pedicle and lay free on the sea floor.

Spiriferinids appeared near the boundary between the Silurian and Devonian, and with the first terebratulids helped make the Early Devonian the high point in brachiopod diversity with the older rhynchonellate orders persisting for a while longer.

 

My earliest spiriferinid specimen is this one, also winkled out from the Glenerie matrix on the back of my Acrospirifer murchisoni.

This is Cyrtina rostrata. Cyrtina was a very successful genus, achieving worldwide distribution, a large number of species and surviving well into the Carboniferous.

This specimen is 1.2 cm wide, though the tip of one of the wings is missing. Spiriferinids were usually small.

A couple of photos showing the very high interarea:

Lateral views:

Some articulation detail:

 

Edited October 29, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

Strophomenates are quite well represented in the Glenerie Formation, but I find few examples of most of them on the web, even here, on the forum. though my favourite genus, the strophomenid Leptaena seems moderately common. I also posted an example of the orthotetid Floweria becraftensis all the way back on page 2 of this thread. Nice brachiopod.

In the Middle and Upper Ordovician, the sowerbyellid strophomenids were an important group and they looked very much like early chonetids. but without the spines along the hinge line. It is thought these gave rise to the early productids which were the chonetids, near the end of the Ordovician.

The chonetids were represented by only the family Strophochonetidae during the Silurian, though they are quite common in some deposits, the group experienced a radiation in the Early Devonian that led to more chonetid families and. a little later to the more spiny Productidina.

In the Glenerie there are a few chonetids represented, including this species, which I have read is reasonably common but oft-overlooked due to its tiny size.

This is another one I winkled out of the matrix on the back of the Acrospirifer.

Anoplia nucleata. 5 mm wide. Quite a lot of hard gloop that I cannot risk removing.

Decent internal detail:

 

Edited October 31, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

That was it for @Misha's brachiopods from the Glenerie Limestone that he sent me. Several new species, so that's brilliant, thank you, my friend.

There were also a couple of sizeable platyceratid gastropods that he sent me, which is nice. The family seems to have been one of the most successful groups during the Ordovician, Silurian and here in the Devonian too. Often they are the only common gastropods in a formation.

These are big and do get bigger.

 

I have seen especially the Devonian species of these being called Platystoma all over the internet and even many times it is mentioned on TFF. I have done it myself. But this is Platystoma.Meigen, 1803.

Notice the date because Platystoma Waagen,1880 is much later, so the fly has priority.

Thus, all the gastropods listed as Platystoma should be referred to Platyostoma (though some have been placed in other genera, I think) Conrad 1842 which they should anyway, as this is also earlier than Platystoma. This seems to have been pointed out repeatedly for more than a century, but people just continued in their old ways. The Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology lists Platyostoma and not Platystoma, except in brackets as a synonym of Platyostoma. Sites like Mindat have all the species listed under Platyostoma and nothing under Platystoma.

So the common Glenerie species that I have, which is often listed incorrectly as Platystoma ventricosa should be Platyostoma ventricosum. Note that the specific name has also changed slightly.

Anyway, here are my specimens:

Number One:

Number Two:

The third one is quite nice, though it's stuck in matrix with some brachiopods. the lucky snail:

I thought I would tag @Fossildude19, @JamieLynn, @Jeffrey Pand @Bguild for starters, who may be interested or may be able to put me right if I am talking nonsense.

And thanks again for my Glenerie fossils, Misha, really expanded my collection, very interesting and I only left you off the list above as I tagged you earlier in this post.

 

Back to my Early Devonian trilobites next!

 

 

 

 

Edited November 4, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Fossildude19]

26 minutes ago, Tidgy's Dad said:

I thought I would tag @Fossildude19, @JamieLynn, @Jeffrey Pand @Bguild for starters who may be interested or may be able to put me right if I am talking nonsense.

And thanks again for my Glenerie fossils, Misha, really expanded my collection, very interesting and I only left you off the list above as I tagged you earlier in this post.

 

 

Very interesting. Someone should tell the Paleontologists they have it wrong! 

All of my sources call these gastropods Platystoma.   (Wilson, 2014  and  Linsley, 1994)

 

 

 

 

Most disconcerting, Linsley 1994  lists 11 different species of Platystoma from the Devonian of NY.     

P. gebardi

P. euomphaloides

P. pleurotoma

P. pustillus

P. desmatum

P. lineata

P. perceense

P. turbinata

P. unisulcata

P. rotundatum

P ventricosa

[ClearLake]

Just an FYI, the Paleobiology Database has everything listed under Platyostoma.  

[Tidgy's Dad]

1 hour ago, Fossildude19 said:

Very interesting. Someone should tell the Paleontologists they have it wrong! 

All of my sources call these gastropods Platystoma. 

Yes, most of mine as well. But palaeontologists do get things wrong. I think they've been getting it wrong for decades.

As do I!

Here's the Treatise entry:

P.  (Platyostoma)  CONRAD, 1842  [*Platyostoma ventricosum;  SD  HALL, 1859  ]  [=Platystoma  LINDSTROM,  1884  (non  MEIGEN,  1803)  (obj.);  Diaphorostoma  FISCHER,  1885  (obj.);  Platycerina  S.A.MILLER,  1889  (obj.);  Osterlina  TALLANT  &  PHILLIP,  1956  (136,  p. 59)].  Naticiform  with several whorls, of which last may or may not be disjunct;  anomphalous to minutely phaneromphalous; irregularities of aperture relatively slight.  Sil.-Dev.,  cosmop. -----FIG.  153,13.  *P.  (P.)  ventricosum  (CONRAD),  L.Dev.,  N.Y.;  Xl.

 

The Trestise entry shows that  the name Platystoma had already been nabbed by Meigen in 1803 and as such is an objective synonym.

Or Mindat;

https://www.mindat.org/taxon-4957482.html

 

Edited November 4, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

On 11/4/2023 at 9:08 PM, Fossildude19 said:

Most disconcerting, Linsley 1994  lists 11 different species of Platystoma from the Devonian of NY.     

P. gebard

P. euomphaloides

P. pleurotoma

P. pustillus

P. desmatum

P. lineata

P. perceense

P. turbinata

P. unisulcata

P. rotundatum

P ventricosa

They are all now in the genera Platyostoma, Diaphorostoma or Pleurotomaria where most of them were or should have been already. Wagner confirmed most of this in 2017. Some of the species names have also changed slightly.

Wagner P. J. (2017) Paleozoic Gastropod, Rostroconch, Helcionelloid and Tergomyan Database

Edited November 6, 2023 by Tidgy's Dad

[Fossildude19]

Just now, Tidgy's Dad said:

They are all now in the genera Platyostroma, Diaphorostoma or Pleurotomaria where most of them were or should have been already. Wagner confirmed most of this in 2017.

Wagner P. J. (2017) Paleozoic Gastropod, Rostroconch, Helcionelloid and Tergomyan Database

 

 

Thanks for that great resource, Adam. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

Back near the bottom of page three of this thread, I posted four rather battered trilobites that I picked up that seemed to have been used as prepping practice. So they were dirt cheap.

I already posted the Gerastos and the Cornuproetus, so here is the Coltraneia sp. a little tidied up. Nothing I could do about some of the breaks, cracks and dings and I guess it was considered suitable for prep practice because most of the eye lenses are missing, and there. 's a big crack through the pygidium.

Love the arched anterior border on this genus:

Not many eye lenses left.

There are three species in Morocco, differentiated by their pygidia, I think.

Coltraneia efelesa, C. ouffatenensis and C. berbera. ranging from the Upper Emsian to the Lower Eifelian.

 

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

This is Hollardops mesocristata, the last of the four in the practice prep batch and thus also Late Emsian to Early Eifelian.

It's one of those folded-over ones so you can't get the whole thing in one shot.

The original prepper was a bit overenthusiastic, I'm afraid.

And the sticking-out genal spines have been broken off.

I could prep this a lot more but the matrix is so hard and it takes so long...............

I love the way the turreted eye sticks out:

Despite the dings, there is still some nice detail on the glabella:

And the eyes.........

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

I love trilobites.

Who doesn't?

But they are quite difficult to find in most of the places to which I've been, are often expensive to purchase and I prefer brachiopods and bryozoans. And oddities.

But I still have at least 70 species and I have only just realised that this is my first lichid!

Branikarges bassei.

All a bit confusing when it has been known as Acanthopyge, Acanthopyge (Lobopyge), Lobopyge  and Belenopyge, and only this year classified as Branikarges.

Big thanks to Scott @piranha for his help with all this.

Hypostome:

[Tidgy's Dad]

I also really love blastoids.

A very interesting group that seems to have evolved from a "cystoid" ancestor back in the Ordovician, but remained a small and unimportant part of the fossil fauna through the Silurian and Devonian until the Mississippian when they flourished and became common and even a dominant group in some places.  This coincides with the extinction of the various "cystoid" groups during the Late Devonian extinction events and the collapse of the Silurian and Devonian tabulate coral/ stromatoporoid reef complexes during roughly the same period.

Having said this, there are a few locations before the Mississippian, when conditions were right, where blastoids can be found in profusion. One of these is the Late Devonian of in China, and another is the earlier Lower Devonian of the Cantabrian mountains in Spain. The latter unit includes the Late Emsian to Early Eifelian La Vid Group and especially the Valporquera Formation (Upper Emsian) where there are a couple of notable beds packed with stemmed echinoderms in the area of Sabero.

The lower bed contains mostly a wide variety of crinoids and the blastoid Pentremitidea,  plus other rare blastoids. while the upper "mud mounds" are packed with fossils of the blastoid Cryptoschisma schultzi, and some rarer Pentremitidea with no crinoids or other blastoids. There can be up to 1.000 specimens of blastoid per square metre of rock.

Most blastoids had a long, segmented, flexible stem much like many crinoids, but Cryptoschisma has a tiny, stiff stem of long cylinders and appears to have just been stuck into the mud with a pointy end, like one of my board pins, in a way that is more like Cambrian stemmed echinoderms before the group developed holdfasts and attachment discs. They appear to have lived in a deeper water, low-energy environment, probably supported by microbial mats, not suited to the crinoids which favoured shallower water at this time, unlike most modern species. This domination of blastoids in deeper water environments and crinoids ruling shallower seas later reoccurs in the Fammenian of China and from the Mississippian to the end of the Permian around the world.

 

I had a specimen of Cryptoschisma schultzi from Sabero for many years, but it got lost somewhere between the UK and Morocco, so I ordered one online as a replacement along with some brachiopods. Sadly, one of the brachiopods I paid for had already been sold by mistake, so the seller sent me three Cryptoschisma schultzi and a Pentremitidia archiaci instead!

Here are the Cryptoschisma schultzi from Cordillera Cantabrica, Leon, near Sabero, Spain.

Details of the nicest one:

Edited January 1 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

Here is my second specimen of a Cryptoschisma schultzi blastoid from Spain, though it is not as nice as the first one shown in the post above.

 

Edited January 4 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

The third Cryptoschisma schultzi blastoid:

Edited January 7 by Tidgy's Dad

[Tidgy's Dad]

The more uncommon blastoid that also occurs in the mud mounds at Colle/ Sabero in Spain is the larger Pentremitidea archiaci.

Here it is next to the little Cryptoschisma schultzi.

Both of these blastoids belong to the order Fissiculata and it appears that Pentremitidea transitioned via a few stages including the intermediate Conuloblastus malladai to Hyperoblastus wachsmuthi which is a basal member of the more advanced order Spiraculata that includes Pentremites and others that become so successful from the Mississippian. Interestingly all of these species occur in the Santa Lucia Formaion below the mud mounds which is crinoid dominated but has rare blastoids and is a shallow water deposit.

 

[Bobby Rico]

Hi mate I thought you really improved them trilobites with your prep work. 

You not see enough blastoids on TFF in my opinion.  I don't have very many in my collection  ( Ralph and MrsR gave me my only examples). Great thread thanks Bobby. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

On 1/11/2024 at 6:52 PM, Bobby Rico said:

Hi mate I thought you really improved them trilobites with your prep work. . 

Thank you, my friend, I did my best but it's really a bit much for my pins and it hurt my thumb.

And I agree about the blastoids; I have a few Mississippian Pentremites, a Permian Deltoblastus, and these Spanish ones, but I think that's all.