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Marine invertebrate pile?


AranHao

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Hello, everyone.
Recently I received an interesting fossil, like a pile of marine invertebrates. It is very hard and heavy. The seller said that he was not sure about the source information. I hope someone can help me identify it.
Thanks

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There is a lot going on there.  Crinoid stems of course, and a solitary coral or two.  Regarding the coiled chambered fossils, given the size I am inclined towards cephalopods, but they might also be large fusilinids.  Do you have any information on the age or the source geological formation/locality?

 

Don

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16 minutes ago, FossilDAWG said:

There is a lot going on there.  Crinoid stems of course, and a solitary coral or two.  Regarding the coiled chambered fossils, given the size I am inclined towards cephalopods, but they might also be large fusilinids.  Do you have any information on the age or the source geological formation/locality?

 

Don

Thank you for your input. Sorry, there is no such information. The seller is just an ordinary antique dealer. He can sell all kinds of antiques and does not focus on fossils. I bought it because I thought it was interesting, just like a small world of the ancient creatures.:)

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The term we usually use for a chuck of matrix like this that is packed with fragmentary fossils is "hash plate" and this is a very beautiful example of one. Imagine a muddy bottom of an ocean with crinoid bits and other invertebrates raining down into this soft mud--possibly the bottom of a sea cliff with a colder anoxic layer where little bacterial degradation happens. Now fast-forward around 400 million years when the muddy matrix has fully hardened into that nice dark gray matrix. A lot of echinoderm parts are made of the harder calcitic form of calcium carbonate rather than the softer aragonitic form used in most bivalve and gastropod mollusks. You end up with a really dense puzzle piece assortment of a nice diversity of fossil organisms. Some hash plates can be stunningly beautiful.

 

You could probably study this one under some light magnification and spot all sorts of beautifully preserved bits and pieces.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

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This is such a beautiful piece, I love hash plates and this is certainly one you could study with a magnifying glass for hours. Congrats on this find!

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4 hours ago, digit said:

You could probably study this one under some light magnification and spot all sorts of beautifully preserved bits and pieces.

Thank you for your vivid imagination. I have this picture in my mind. I don't know much about these, but I can really take this opportunity to learn.:)

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2 hours ago, ScottBlooded said:

This is such a beautiful piece, I love hash plates and this is certainly one you could study with a magnifying glass for hours. Congrats on this find!

Thanks for your kind words :)

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