Supposed fossil plant from Colombia actually a juvenile sea turtle

[DD1991]

A couple of fossils from the Early Cretaceous of Colombia originally classified as plants have been reidentified as juvenile sea turtle fossils:

Fossil plant or turtle? (palaeo-electronica.org)

Turns out a 100-million-year-old plant fossil was really a baby turtle (cosmosmagazine.com)

Fossil first identified as plant is actually a baby turtle | Popular Science (popsci.com)

 

The initial assignment of Sphenophyllum colombianum to Sphenophyllum by Huertas (2003) was perplexing because Sphenophyllum is known only from the late Devonian to Permian, but the reclassification of S. colombianum as a marine turtle removes the sole chronologically extraneous record of Sphenophyllum. 

 

Huertas, G. 2003. Flora Fósil de Villa de Leyva y sus alrededores. Camargo Editores, Chía, Colombia.

[Shellseeker]

9 hours ago, DD1991 said:

A couple of fossils from the Early Cretaceous of Colombia originally classified as plants have been reidentified as juvenile sea turtle fossils:

Fossil plant or turtle? (palaeo-electronica.org)

Turns out a 100-million-year-old plant fossil was really a baby turtle (cosmosmagazine.com)

Fossil first identified as plant is actually a baby turtle | Popular Science (popsci.com)

 

The initial assignment of Sphenophyllum colombianum to Sphenophyllum by Huertas (2003) was perplexing because Sphenophyllum is known only from the late Devonian to Permian, but the reclassification of S. colombianum as a marine turtle removes the sole chronologically extraneous record of Sphenophyllum. 

 

Huertas, G. 2003. Flora Fósil de Villa de Leyva y sus alrededores. Camargo Editores, Chía, Colombia.

Thank you for sharing,  Great read... and I love the photo of this fossil carapace. 

 

[Missourian]

Very cool.

 

It's always nice when that goes the other way around