Pennsylvanian Sponge or Crinoid from Arizona

[BobWill]

Thanks @KimTexan.The resort is near the center of the west side so that makes it the Deese Formation? Is there a map online that shows the formations better than the USGS and the maps from O.U. ?

[KimTexan]

I don’t know. I use an iPhone app called Mancos the Roger Farish told me about. It lets you find the formation just about anywhere in the world.

[DPS Ammonite]

I sent a picture of mystery fossils to David Elliott, a paleontologist at Northern Arizona University who has co authored several papers on the Naco Formation. He has found some of them too and had no idea what they are. His very uncertain guess was a sponge.

[Tidgy's Dad]

@Spongy Joe

Come back, all is forgiven! 

[KimTexan]

I wonder if the Sam Noble Museum in Oklahoma would know what Bob’s are. They have an extensive collection there. They have an online searchable database. Here is the link.

https://samnoblemuseum.ou.edu/collections-and-research/invertebrate-paleontology/

Sometimes the database is not user friendly though.

[piranha]

A colleague in the geology department replied: "I am thinking they are silicified evaporate roses, probably barite originally."

[Wrangellian]

Good to think outside the box, but something tells me these are biological - the holes in the tops of some of the protrusions, the 'bridges' between protrusions (on some).... Just a hunch that I can't back up with anything!

[DPS Ammonite]

I have made a little progress in the ID. I found mm long needles next to an in situ fossil that suggests that this may be a sponge with spicules or root tufts. The large spikes have smaller bumps that might be spicule attachment points. 

 

Now the hard part, looking for a sponge expert. Any suggestions?

[Innocentx]

I don't know if there were some type of entobia in that area, but might be a possibility.

[abyssunder]

Coralline algae might look similar, but they are recorded from the Early Cretaceous - onward.

 

picture from here

[abyssunder]

This might be interesting, related to Rhodoliths.

[Innocentx]

46 minutes ago, abyssunder said:

related to Rhodoliths

Ah ha.  In that case this PDF: 

 

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09670262.2014.984347

[abyssunder]

I read it before my post (September, 25, 11:51:22 PM), just to be sure.
It has an interesting introduction and great figures.
Thank you!

[Innocentx]

I didn't know which format might be easier to read. The PDF is downloadable, only difference.

[DPS Ammonite]

 

I found a 1.75 cm diameter red orange silicified specimen with mostly intact spikes embedded in Pennsylvanian Naco Limestone. Two similar but smaller spiky balls are thought to be Wewokellidae or Haplistion sp. sponge spicules. See plate 1 figure 7 of reference below. 

 

“Some Pennsylvanian and Permian Sponges from Southwestern Oklahoma and North-Central Texas” by Rigby and Mapes, Brigham Young University Studies, Vol. 45, 2000.

 

 

Another reference: “A Monograph of British Fossil Sponges” by Hinde has two similar spicules sans the cross pieces in the center of the balls. They are Asteractinella and Thollasterella.

 

The  general shape of the sponge that might have contained the spiky balls is unknown since they have only have been found as singles. I find it odd that I have not found multiples of them in one rock since I just found two in rocks that are located near other rocks

which are loaded with large pieces of Wewokella and other sponges. I have yet to find in the literature any sponges with such large and stout spicules. I wonder if each spicule is either a single sponge or another unidentified calcareous organism.

 

@BobWill

 

[TqB]

That latest spicule is beautiful! Rather large, but some of the similar ones you've figured seem to get to about 5mm so not crazy.

 

Here's  Haplistion vermiculatum Carter from vol. 1 of the Hinde monograph (plate 5) - fig. 2 at x2 magnification is of a whole specimen that would be about 1cm across, highly reminiscent of some of your original specimens.

[DPS Ammonite]

 

Could this be a heteractinid sponge spicule? @TqB @Archie @BobWill

 

Tarquin defined heteractinid spicules as:

“They're calcareous sponges rather than siliceous and are characterised by spicules like that with basic hexagonal symmetry i.e. six rays in one plane (though there can be more or less). (In hexactinellids, the six rays (when they have them) are arranged 3D, on three axes at right angles to each other.)”

 

This 1.75 cm diameter red orange silicified specimen with mostly intact rays was embedded in Pennsylvanian Naco Limestone. I suspect that it was originally calcareous because all the identifiable red chert sponges from the Naco Formation were originally calcareous.

 

I believe that the free spicules, spiky balls, from the same formation have the ends of the rays broken off and were originally much larger.

 

I can see the hexagonal symmetry of heteractinids in my pieces.  All of the spiky balls were flattened in one direction possible the main axis. The other axis of hexagonal symmetry are normal to the main central axis. Some spicules, like mine, have so many rays that the original hexagonal symmetry can be covered up. See spicule D (Asteractinella) in the screenshot of a book on sponges edited by Hooper.

[Archie]

I'm sorry I'm no good with sponges at all, they are all incredibly cool though!  

[TqB]

14 hours ago, DPS Ammonite said:

 

Could this be a heteractinid sponge spicule? @TqB @Archie @BobWill

 

Tarquin defined heteractinid spicules as:

“They're calcareous sponges rather than siliceous and are characterised by spicules like that with basic hexagonal symmetry i.e. six rays in one plane (though there can be more or less). (In hexactinellids, the six rays (when they have them) are arranged 3D, on three axes at right angles to each other.)”

 

This 1.75 cm diameter red orange silicified specimen with mostly intact rays was embedded in Pennsylvanian Naco Limestone. I suspect that it was originally calcareous because all the identifiable red chert sponges from the Naco Formation were originally calcareous.

 

It has the same structure as Asteractinella, so the answer is probably yes - class Heteractinida, order Octactinellida.

 

From the Treatise: "The Octactinellida are here interpreted as all those sponges centering about Astraeospongium, characterized by coarse-rayed spicules composed of radially fibrous calcite and derivable from the plan of an octactine. They are essentially the so-called true heteractinids."

 

Here's a better Asteractinella expansa plate than the one I put on a few posts ago, from the original Hinde monograph (1887) - still a valid species according to the Treatise. It's from the upper Mississippian of Scotland (lower Limestone, Brigantian Stage).

The largest spicule, top right, is 5mm, so yours would be huge and magnificent at 17.5mm!

(Note that 3e at x20 is about half the size, 2.5mm.) 

 

 

I think the spiky balls show different geometry and are actually small sponges with articulated groups of spicule fibres (if they are spicular, which I'm nearly convinced of), more like the lithistid Haplistion:

Treatise: "Spheroidal, ovoid, discoid, lobate, or irregular; no cloaca; cylindroid spiculofibers radiating from an eccentric center of growth and end as hispid projections at surface." (Hispid = bristly).

These would be originally siliceous.

The one in the plate is about 1cm across.

[Shamalama]

A fascinating thread to read through. I was going to suggest a mineralogical origin with Chert pseudomorphing Aragonite but the Sponge theory seems valid now. Great sleuthing!

[DPS Ammonite]

The spiky balls and the 1.7cm spicule probably are the same. It is hard to see in the picture of the 1.7cm sponge spicule, but it also ridges that extend from most rays to adjacent rays. The exact same pattern is found in the spiky balls. I believe that the long rays have broken off. 

 

[TqB]

4 minutes ago, DPS Ammonite said:

The spiky balls and the 1.7cm spicule probably are the same. It is hard to see in the picture of the 1.7cm sponge spicule, but it also ridges that extend from most rays to adjacent rays. The exact same pattern is found in the spiky balls. I believe that the long rays have broken off. 

 

 

I see what you mean now. I think that indicates that the single "spicule" is thus another complete small sponge - the rods in the broken off ones seem clearly to be connected by other rods (rather than ridges) which I think would rule out single spicule. It also removes the problem of it being massive!

So they all may be spiky Hyalostelia-type lithistid demosponges. They're certainly beautiful little beasts!

[BobWill]

Broken-off rods seems perfectly consistent with what I found too. I still haven't gotten back up to OK to look for more but I will post whatever I find when I do.