Acanthodes Bronni

[oilshale]

This Acanthodes bronni Agassiz,1833 is from the ironstone nodules of the Lebach Group of the Saar region of Germany. People used to dig there for ironstone nodules in open pits since the Late Iron age (500 BC). The Latène period was a European Iron age culture named after the archeological site La Tène on the north side of Lake Neuchâtel in Switzerland. The Latène culture was widespread throughout Europe; archeological evidence of this culture was found in France, Switzerland, southwest Germany, Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia; Hungary and even as far as Romania. Since the iron ore content of these siderite concretions or "Lebacher Eier", how they are called in Germany (Lebacher eggs), is less than 20%, these pits were closed at the end of the 19^th century.

Acanthodes bronni was preyed by large temnospondyl amphibians such as Archegosaurus decheni whereas Archegosaurus decheni on the other side was preyed by the even larger Xenacanth shark Triodus sessilis.

Here is a publication by Jürgen Krivet et al.: "First direct evidence of a vertebrate three-level trophic chain in the fossil record"

A Xenacanth shark from Lebach preserving two temnospondyl amphibians in its digestive tract as well as the remains of an acanthodian fish, which was ingested by one of the temnospondyls!

Kriwet2007ThreeLevelFossil.pdf

Sort of a Matryoshka doll, one inside the other!

Thomas

Edited January 1, 2011 by oilshale

[Auspex]

Fossils tell thousands of stories, and this is a good one! (Both the fossil and the story)

[piranha]

Fascinating fossil and pdf article Thomas!

Thanks for posting it for us and Happy New Year!

[RCFossils]

VERY COOL!

[Heliophyllum360]

Neat fossil and associated article.

[Terry Dactyll]

Good stuff!....Thanks.....