Six Devonian Silica Shale Fossils Needing Help With

[minnbuckeye]

Last week took me back to my home state of Ohio in order to attend a conference. On the way home, I stopped at the Paulding Fossil Gardens to play in the Silica Shale for awhile before returning to the white landscape of Minnesota. There are a few unknowns that I ran across and am hoping for a little help! @Peat Burns

 

These tiny squiggles are on top of a bryozoan covered brachiopod. The pores of the bryozoan can be seen. IDed as Microconchids.

 

 

I thought this was a bryozoan until I looked at the enlarged picture. Now I feel it is crinoidal, but what?

 

 

I have searched high and low for a bivalve in the Silica 

Shale that matches this.

 

 

These tiny brachiopods remind me of an atrypa but are very small and fairly smooth. IDed as Athyris sp.

 

 

Bryozoans are so common at Paulding and I assumed this was a brachiopod covered with one. But looking at the exposed edge, I do not see any evidence of a shell. So does the silica shale have anything that mimics Prasapora of the Ordovician? IDed as Fistuliporoid bryozoan.

 

 

N

Finally, no guess on this one! Well maybe a trilobite roller but that is a long shot!! IDed as Rugosa Coral.

Edited February 28, 2023 by minnbuckeye

[Fossildude19]

Mike,

I think #2 is a crinoid holdfast.

 

[Rockwood]

1 hour ago, minnbuckeye said:

tiny squiggles

1 looks like elements from crinoid feeding arms. It doesn't quite line up with this description though.

[Northern Sharks]

My initial impression of #1 is Spirorbis worm tubes.

[ClearLake]

In Kesling and Chilman (1975) Silica Formation Megafossils, your brachiopod (#5) would be Athyris, maybe not the A. vittata, but one of what they call Athyris sp. A or Athyris sp. B

Your tiny squiggles (#1) might be Spirorbis and your #4 could be a worn Fistuliporoid.  

 

I'll keep looking at some other options.

[Jeffrey P]

I also think #2 is a crinoid holdfast.

[Misha]

#1 is too old for Spirorbis, I believe those are microconchids

#2 could it be an Aulocystis sp. or a similar tabulate coral? I have one from the Devonian in NY which I initially confused for crinoid holdfast, it looks quite similar to this object

#5 I agree with Athyris sp.

 

 

Edit:

Here's that coral fossil I was talking about 

Edited February 27, 2023 by Misha

[connorp]

I think #2 is probably a coral of some sort. Crinoid material is rare at Paulding.

#6 looks like a worn rugose coral.

Edited February 27, 2023 by connorp

[ClearLake]

1 hour ago, Misha said:

#1 is too old for Spirorbis, I believe those are microconchids

Thanks for bringing this up, it got me thinking about it again as I'm sure I have heard this before.  Its probably been on TFF numerous times before, but I did not remember the specifics.  And its always a bit confounding as databases like the Paleobiology Database (which is very useful and used a lot) still list Spirorbis species back to the Ordovician and of course if one is using older literature as I was above (OK, 1975 is not that old, but in this case, it is before the change), you are going to get the old name.  My usual method of a quick look for name updates did not help.

 

A quick search led me to a 2006 paper by Taylor and Vinn (Convergence in small spiral worm tubes (‘Spirorbis’) and its palaeoenvironmental implications) which made the case that all pre-Cretaceous tube like fossils previously assigned to Spirobis did not belong in that genus (or even the same Phylum probably!) due to shell microstructure, etc.  All the older material were reclassified as microconchids in the genus Microconchus (probably an equally wastebasket-ish classification as the previous one, but at least it cut the group in two).  Interestingly, microconchids died out and serpulids arose with little to no overlap according to the paper (I wonder if that has been further studied since then??

 

Thanks again, I'm off to clean up my database!

[FossilDAWG]

What condition are the "Paulding Fossil Gardens" in these days? When I last stopped there about 2 years ago it was mostly overgrown and clearly had not received fresh material in a long time.

[ClearLake]

8 minutes ago, FossilDAWG said:

What condition are the "Paulding Fossil Gardens" in these days? When I last stopped there about 2 years ago it was mostly overgrown and clearly had not received fresh material in a long time

That's how it was when I was there last summer (June 2022) so hopefully Mike @minnbuckeye will tell us it is fully refreshed now! (But I doubt it).  There were still fossils to be found and I was mostly interested in matrix to break down at the time, so I was able to find what I was after.

[connorp]

15 minutes ago, FossilDAWG said:

What condition are the "Paulding Fossil Gardens" in these days? When I last stopped there about 2 years ago it was mostly overgrown and clearly had not received fresh material in a long time.

It is in quite sad shape. There's tons of rock but its mostly overgrown. Even if they just turned over the field that would expose so much untouched rock, but I doubt that will happen.

[Rockwood]

3 hours ago, connorp said:

I think #2 is probably a coral of some sort. Crinoid material is rare at Paulding.

Sorry. You need to name the coral, before I will even take that reasoning seriously. 

[connorp]

2 hours ago, Rockwood said:

Sorry. You need to name the coral, before I will even take that reasoning seriously. 

I was not saying it is a coral because crinoid material is rare. That was a separate remark.

[Rockwood]

3 hours ago, connorp said:

I was not saying it is a coral because crinoid material is rare. That was a separate remark.

Then why do you think it's a coral ?

[minnbuckeye]

@ClearLake, @connorp, and @FossilDAWG, the condition of the park was as stated, tons of rock but its mostly overgrown. Only the western row or two looked like they were added last year.   Being winter time, weeds were not an issue for me. In fact, my better finds were actually in the older rows of rock, as the erosive forces of nature had worked a number on these piles.

 

Thanks to all for their input!!!  

 

Looks like opinions vary on item #2. When photographing the rock, I didn't even know the specimen existed due to its small size and my poor eyesight! So a ruler was not included in the photo. It is 1.4cm long and the tubules are less than 1 mm wide. I know those in the coral group are using Aulocystis as an example of corals in the Silica Shale. This specimen seems way too small for that. Actually it seems small for a crinoid too!!! Back to bryozoan?????? After going over the species list for the Paulding Fossil Garden that @Peat Burns compiled, I still can't come to a logical identification for that (OR the bivalve).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Rockwood]

Maybe what's supposed to be there isn't always what is there ?

[minnbuckeye]

A few more pics of the crinoid/ coral:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 28, 2023 by minnbuckeye

[crinus]

These pic are better and I will say that in the fourth picture you have a Aulocystis or Aulopora coral.  That third picture sure look crinoidal but I am not sure.  Could even be a holdfast. Blastoids are pretty common at Paulding if you are in the right layer.  Maybe blastoid holdfast.  Whatever, but coral for sure on the fourth pic.

Joe

[minnbuckeye]

@crinus. The last 4 pictures are of the same questionable find. The first is from a distance showing its small size. Then a closeup followed by even closer pictures of both ends. Does this alter your thoughts?? 

[ClearLake]

For your bivalve (#3), it is tough due to the preservation, but based on the general shape (somewhat elongated), thinness, and position of the umbo, I would suggest it is most likely some species of Paleoneilo.  The only figure in Kesling and Chillman (Plate 104, #20) is an even more elongated specimen, but the description in the book matches reasonably well (and much better than any other genus described).  Also, in looking through the Middle Devonian bivalves in Wilsons (2014) Field Guide to Devonian Fossils of New York, Paleoneilo looks like a reasonable choice although your umbo does seem a bit more centrally located.  In the figure below from Linsley (1994) Devonian Paleontology of New York, think of what a cast the interior of #26 would look like and I believe it is close to what you have.

 

[crinus]

No I knew what the pictures were.  I suspect that you may have two different specimens buried on top of one another.  I am absolutely positive you have a coral lying on the lower part. It is the piece sticking up that is questionable.

Joe