New to me Ordovician/St Leon find

[JimTh]

Looks kind of like wood, but I know it’s not. The only candidates I have found are stromatolites and bryozoa. I’ve been to St Leon probably 6 times now and never seen this before. 

 

[JimTh]

[JimTh]

Trying to use my 60x clip on lens for my phone. 

[erose]

Tetradium. Most often lumped in with corals but it's taxonomic relations have been in question for some time. I lost track of it's current position.  It has tiny coralites closer in size to the zooids of bryozoa but not bryozoa.

 

http://strata.uga.edu/cincy/fauna/tabulata/Tetradium.html

 

Were you high up in the section? These are most common in the Upper Whitewater/Saluda section at the top of the cut where many other colonial corals can be found.

[FossilDAWG]

I find the argument that it was a red algae to be convincing.  I'll have to look up the reference but H. Mirriam-Steele was the author.  Genus names have to be unique within a Kingdom, and within the plants Tetradium was used for a tree before it was first applied to the fossil, so the name is preoccupied and not available for use for the fossil in question.  The name Prismatophyllum is now the correct name for the genus, if you accept the hypothesis that the fossil is an algae.

 

Don

[Innocentx]

Another possibility, slim chance perhaps? See partway down page one.

 

 

 

Also see

 

https://woostergeologists.scotblogs.wooster.edu/2012/02/05/woosters-fossil-of-the-week-a-mysterious-sponge-late-ordovician-of-ohio/

[JimTh]

2 hours ago, erose said:

Tetradium. Most often lumped in with corals but it's taxonomic relations have been in question for some time. I lost track of it's current position.  It has tiny coralites closer in size to the zooids of bryozoa but not bryozoa.

 

http://strata.uga.edu/cincy/fauna/tabulata/Tetradium.html

 

Were you high up in the section? These are most common in the Upper Whitewater/Saluda section at the top of the cut where many other colonial corals can be found.

 

Found in the top of the blue layer, eroding out.  All pieces found within about 12”.