#fossil plate

[transparentfossil]

6.3" Fossil Seed Fern (Alethopteris) Plate - Pennsylvania

[uk-fossils]

Fossil Bryozoan Sea Floor Slab – Silurian Wenlock Limestone, Wrens Nest Dudley UK

A beautifully preserved Fossil Sea Floor Slab featuring colonial bryozoans, sourced from the Wenlock Limestone Formation and dated to the Wenlockian Stage of the Silurian period (~428–423 million years ago). This fossil originates from the iconic Wrens Nest site in Dudley, West Midlands, UK — a globally important locality and one of the UK’s most famous fossil sites.

Bryozoans, often referred to as “moss animals,” are colonial, filter-feeding marine invertebrates that flourished in Silurian reef environments. This specimen displays a dense patch of bryozoan colonies encrusting the sea floor slab, capturing the biodiversity and ecological dynamics of ancient tropical marine settings.

Fossil Type: Colonial Bryozoans (marine invertebrates)

Geological Age: Silurian – Wenlockian Stage

Formation: Wenlock Limestone Formation

Depositional Environment: The Wenlock Limestone was formed in a warm, shallow marine environment, characterised by reef systems, carbonate platforms, and high biodiversity. These conditions facilitated extensive bryozoan growth alongside corals, crinoids, brachiopods, and trilobites.

Morphological Features:

Encrusting colonies with finely detailed zooecial structures

Calcareous, branching, or sheet-like growth patterns

Preserved in original sea floor matrix with natural bedding plane

Notable:

Genuine fossil from a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)

Rich marine fossil content from a classic British Silurian locality

Excellent display specimen or educational aid

Photo shows the exact item you will receive

Authenticity: All of our fossils are 100% genuine natural specimens and come with a Certificate of Authenticity. The scale in the photo shows 1cm per square or cube – please consult the image for full dimensions.

This bryozoan sea floor slab from the Silurian reef ecosystems of Dudley offers a remarkable window into early marine life and is a striking addition to any fossil collection.

[acorviart]

archaeopteryx 🪶

[shadyufo]

A few recent photos taken down at the creek to finish 2024 out!

For 2025, my goals are to make a lot more art and spend a lot more time out in nature. Mainly just aiming to survive and thrive. <3

I hope this coming year brings SO much love and joy and prosperity to all of you wonderfully rad folks. Thank you for making this world a better and brighter place <3

[srlgemstone]

The travertine deposits where it is found are geothermal. The sudden change in temperature due to technonic movements contributed to the rapid disappearance of the soft tissues of the crabs and the fossilization of their shells by covering them with sedimentary layers.

Tiny Travertine crab

[crossroadsdog]

Giraffatitan 2024

[mineralsrocksandfossiltalks]

Throwback Thursday: Continental Drift

Before there was the Theory of Plate Tectonics, there was the theory of continental drift. Almost as soon as maps were invented , people noticed how certain continents looked like they could be pieced together. In 1800, Alexander von Humboldt noticed that the west coast of Africa and the east coast of South America seemed to fit together.

Antonio Snider-Pellegrini, a French geographer and geologist in the 1800s noticed that North American and European coal deposits had identical plant fossils. e said ha could be explained if the two continents had been joined. He even drew his own map:

Perhaps the most well known of the geologists to bring up continental drift was Alfred Wegener. Born in 1880 in Berlin, he would become a very important figure in 20th century science.

He was primarily a climatologist but his feld work led him to some very big ideas. He too noticed how the landmasses seemed to fit together. He drew this to demonstrate the drifting pattern.

He did more than look at maps though. He analysed both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and found matching rock types, matching geologic structures and matching fossils.

The biggest issue he had in publicly advocating for this was that he had no method for how continental drift worked. Unfortunately, he would never know the mechanism as it was discovered in the 1960's long after his death.

Want to know more about Alfred Wegener and his Theory of Continental Drift? Check out my mini Geology 101 lessons on Patreon!

[mckittericks]

We found a couple shark teeth fossils today. You know, one or two.

[moonsappho]

i am truly so frightened of the american decline. why am i searching for an article on a basic theory of geology right now and getting nothing but young earth propaganda multiple pages deep

[lenreli]

Felt a small shake and was confused as to what the fuck that was until I checked my phone. Which alerted me to a small earthquake.

Ah.

[transparentfossil]

plate of 8 fossil fish specimens -Knightia eocena- Ypresian Wyoming USA

[uk-fossils]

Fossil Bryozoan Sea Floor Slab – Silurian Wenlock Limestone, Wrens Nest Dudley UK

A beautifully preserved Fossil Sea Floor Slab featuring colonial bryozoans, sourced from the Wenlock Limestone Formation and dated to the Wenlockian Stage of the Silurian period (~428–423 million years ago). This fossil originates from the iconic Wrens Nest site in Dudley, West Midlands, UK — a globally important locality and one of the UK’s most famous fossil sites.

Bryozoans, often referred to as “moss animals,” are colonial, filter-feeding marine invertebrates that flourished in Silurian reef environments. This specimen displays a dense patch of bryozoan colonies encrusting the sea floor slab, capturing the biodiversity and ecological dynamics of ancient tropical marine settings.

Fossil Type: Colonial Bryozoans (marine invertebrates)

Geological Age: Silurian – Wenlockian Stage

Formation: Wenlock Limestone Formation

Depositional Environment: The Wenlock Limestone was formed in a warm, shallow marine environment, characterised by reef systems, carbonate platforms, and high biodiversity. These conditions facilitated extensive bryozoan growth alongside corals, crinoids, brachiopods, and trilobites.

Morphological Features:

Encrusting colonies with finely detailed zooecial structures

Calcareous, branching, or sheet-like growth patterns

Preserved in original sea floor matrix with natural bedding plane

Notable:

Genuine fossil from a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI)

Rich marine fossil content from a classic British Silurian locality

Excellent display specimen or educational aid

Photo shows the exact item you will receive

Authenticity: All of our fossils are 100% genuine natural specimens and come with a Certificate of Authenticity. The scale in the photo shows 1cm per square or cube – please consult the image for full dimensions.

This bryozoan sea floor slab from the Silurian reef ecosystems of Dudley offers a remarkable window into early marine life and is a striking addition to any fossil collection.

[dropsofsciencenews]

A Record-Breaking Old Bean

ESP version ITA version

Can a seed be among the largest ever recorded in the fossil record, represent the first evidence of migration between tectonic plates towards the Australian region, and also be the only known ancestor of the Moreton Bay chestnut (Castanospermum australe)?

The answer is a resounding yes.

Who are we talking about? Its name is Jantungspermum gunnellii, a leguminous plant dating back to the Eocene period, approximately 34-40 million years ago. The discovery of this plant was the result of extreme determination and, perhaps, a bit of luck. Collecting fossils in southern Borneo is a considerable challenge: most of the surface rocks are constantly eroded by heavy tropical rains, covered by dense vegetation, and in many cases, overshadowed by buildings or agricultural land. Despite these difficulties, in 2014, a team of researchers collected three large fossil seeds from the seams of a coal mine in South Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo, the largest of which measured 7.2 cm in length, along with 43 leaves and two pollen samples. All the material was brought to the laboratory for detailed analysis.

To the great surprise of the researchers, the seeds found appear to be ancient relatives of the Castanospermum genus, of which today only one species exists worldwide. However, this lineage hides further surprises linked to tectonic movements. The collision between the tectonic plates of Southeast Asia and Australia, which began about 20 million years ago and is still ongoing, has led to a significant exchange of plant and animal species between these land masses. During the Cenozoic era, the area was affected by two major geological events: the Asia-India and Sahul-Sunda collisions. Sahul is part of the continental platform of the Australian continent and lies off the coasts of Australia, while Sunda is part of the Eurasian plate. The contact and collision between these regions allowed numerous plant lineages from Australia to migrate to Asia. This is evident from the fact that species found in the Asian fossil records are also present in the older Australian fossil records, suggesting that these plants initially evolved in Australia and later colonized Asia, providing a clear temporal signal of the migration.

But could the plants have made the reverse journey, from Asia to Australia? The rarity of plant macrofossils from Sunda has so far limited the understanding of pre-collision vegetation and the plants that migrated from Sunda to Sahul. Evidence in this regard was scarce and mainly based on palynological and molecular data. Until now. The discovery of this seed has provided the first macrofossil evidence of a plant evolutionary line that moved from Asia to Australia. Since Jantungspermum belongs to the same subfamily as Castanospermum, we can also hypothesize how the seeds may have dispersed. Today, Castanospermum disperses its seeds using floating, salt-tolerant pods that can travel for kilometers in rivers and oceans, especially after storm events. The fossil seeds of Jantungspermum were recovered from the upper Tambak Member (a member is a part of a geological formation distinguishable from the rest of the formation by its lithological characteristics) in a coastal depositional paleoenvironments, probably brackish, suggesting that their pods traveled a significant distance, similarly to its descendants, from the riparian parent plant before disintegrating and releasing their seeds.

The incredibility of this seed does not end here. These fossils also represent the oldest legume fossils in the Malay Archipelago. Moreover, the seeds are among the largest ever recorded in the fossil record, excluding coconuts and some other palms. They likely grew in a pod that reached the length of a baseball bat and could contain up to five seeds. The name Jantungspermum gunnellii derives from the Indonesian word "Jantung," which means heart, in reference to the shape of the fossil seed. "Spermum" means seed in Latin, while the specific term "gunnellii" is a tribute to the late Gregg Gunnell, a vertebrate paleontologist formerly at the Duke University Lemur Center, who led the expedition.

There are still many stories buried beneath the rock, and sometimes, a small yet big seed can reveal one of them.

source

[smallhatlogan]

i could spend my entire life shark tooth fossil hunting at a river and never get bored with it and i think that trait should be more useful for me to have

[brucebabener]

it is crazy how every year the gap in performance between my gen ed classes and my advanced class keeps growing like crazy. today we started the first lesson of a new unit and in all but one of my gen classes we didn’t even finish, whereas my advanced class not only finished the lesson with 20 minutes left of class, they proved to me that they know literally everything from the unit so i dont even need to teach it. lesson one. of unit one. and also they got into a very heated battle over who would get to read out loud.

[vivechan]

What Is Earth »Age, Radius, Earth Plates, Structure, Climate

What Is Earth » Age, Radius, Earth Plates, Rotation, Warming What is Earth  » Earth is the third planet from the Sun in our solar system and the only known celestial body to support life. It is the fifth-largest planet by diameter and the densest of all the planets. What Is Earth »Age, Radius, Earth Plates, Structure, Climate Scales Of The Universe » This Distance Is Equal To 9.46 X 1015 M Or…