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Defensive Posture Trilobites


mikeymig

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Im not sure if its a defensive posture or not but both of these Moroccan trilobites have their spiny tails up in the air. It could be just the way they are prepped (by Gerald Kloc) but I would like to think that before they were buried they tried to defend themselves the only way they knew how. I don't have any Moroccan trilobites in my collection but since they were prepared by my friend and neighbor Gerald Kloc.

mikey

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post-7129-0-91856400-1408672868_thumb.jpg

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Wow, those are some beautiful Trilos! The prep jobs looks amazing.

A fossil hunter needs sharp eyes and a keen search image, a mental template that subconsciously evaluates everything he sees in his search for telltale clues. -Richard E. Leakey

http://prehistoricalberta.lefora.com

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The trilobites and prep are excellent! :fistbump:

An important update for your label is Philipsmithiana is not a valid genus:

 

Quote
Both Hollardops Morzadec, 1997 and Philipsmithiana Lieberman and Kloc, 1997 were erected in the same year with Asteropyge mesocristata as type species. Morzadec’s publication appeared first so Hollardops has seniority, and because both genera share the same type species, Phillipsmithiana becomes a junior objective synonym and must not be used.
 
Chatterton, B.D.E., Fortey, R.A., Brett, K.D., Gibb, S.L, & McKellar, R.C. (2006)
Trilobites from the upper Lower to Middle Devonian Timrhanrhart Formation, Jbel Gara et Zguilma, southern Morocco.
Palaeontographica Canadiana, 25:1-177

 

 

 

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The prep on those is simply out of this World awesome! Beautiful pieces Mikey.

....or maybe that was their sexy mating dance. Trilo twerking?

~Charlie~

"There are those that look at things the way they are, and ask why.....i dream of things that never were, and ask why not?" ~RFK
->Get your Mosasaur print
->How to spot a fake Trilobite
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Hi again Mikey,

 

Adding some more info, and just by coincidence, your specimen of Treveropyge is now classified as Coltraneia Lieberman & Kloc 1997, and matches quite well with C. oufatenensis Morzadec 2001. Congrats again on the great examples, the prep is simply spectacular!

 

Morzadec, Pierre (2001)
Les Trilobites Asteropyginae du Dévonien de l'Anti-Atlas (Maroc).
Asteropyginae Trilobites from the Devonian of the Anti-Atlas (Morocco).
Palaeontographica Abt.A, 262:53-85
 
 
 

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In answer to your original question: I wonder if that position, as often is the case with fossil fish, is brought on by decaying gases which cause the corpse to bloat up? I understand that the typical defensive reaction of trilobites was to roll up into a ball.

 

Greetings from the Lake of Constance. Roger

http://www.steinkern.de/

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When you find a curved trilobite like the Hollardops in your topic, you actually have the choice as a preparator to decide whether the posture is 'head up' or 'tail up'. But the latter makes for a far more dramatic piece ^_^

I must admit that I prefer the tailspines up position, too. Here's a Hollardops I prepped last year:

As found:

987338833Cut.jpg

Here during the prep. At about this point I made the decision for the final posture.

1460972912DSC-4568.JPG

And the end result:

1863616854Holl-1.jpg

974041673Holl-2.jpg

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Thanks Scott. I had a feeling the names were different then the labels that they came with. I'm gonna need your help with 2-3 more trilobites that came in the lot with no lables.

Nice job Fred! Boy are two bugs look a lot alike.

Thank you all for your comments!

Mikey

Many times I've wondered how much there is to know.  
led zeppelin

 

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Beautiful specimens.

As for the body posture, it’s difficult to believe that “tail-up” (or “head-up”) was a defensive posture. With enrollment (by tucking the pygidium up into the cephalic cavity) as the “last resort” defensive position, then flexing the tail or head upwards would not have been an efficient opening defence. It would require the position to be “undone” by reversing the movement before the body could then be enrolled with the curvature in the opposite orientation for better full-armour protection. In that enrolled position (which early trilobites were only able to maintain for short periods because they did not have the complex “locking” mechanisms of later trilobites), any tail spikes would then potentially project beyond the head for further protection.

That would also be a better position for “flight” as the final option, rather than a posture where the tail or head were curled upwards. There are grounds for believing that the swimming posture for trilobites was usually inverted (ie “belly-up”), with limb gills serving as paddles. That’s typical for many aquatic (marine and freshwater) arthropods today… fairy shrimp for example. For a trilobite with the tail tucked up under the head “jack-knife” fashion, it would have been an easy movement to flick the head back and propel away from a predator in that inverted posture. With either the tail or head raised it would need a backwards or forwards half-somersault.

Roger

I keep six honest serving-men (they taught me all I knew);Their names are What and Why and When and How and Where and Who [Rudyard Kipling]

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It seems to me to be an unlikely happenstance that a creature would become 'locked' in such a defensive posture at death.

"There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant

“Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley

>Paleontology is an evolving science.

>May your wonders never cease!

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For the Burgess shale critters, they believe many of the animals were caught in an underwater landslide, or rather mudslide. So the animals were alive at the time of burial.

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...or were killed when carried into the anoxic depths. Being buried in a sub-surface mud flow alone probably would not have killed them immediately where they lay.

"There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant

“Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley

>Paleontology is an evolving science.

>May your wonders never cease!

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I thought "maybe" the trilobites could have been in a death throe while being buried alive. I've seen animals do weird things before they die and its the first thing that I thought of when I saw these two for the first time. The trilobites from this formation are preserved well and weren't lying around decaying. I didn't research it Its just something I thought made sense.

mikey

Many times I've wondered how much there is to know.  
led zeppelin

 

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