Friday, December 17, 2010

Funky Old Leptaena


The funky old Leptaena brachiopod fossil to paraphrase the name of Tone Loc song's Funky Cold Medina.  The Leptaena waldronensis brachiopods found in the Waldron Shale of Clark County, Indiana are quite fragile.  The glue stick needs to be used to hold the shell pieces in place when one of this size is found.

What one might not realize is how tall these creatures were in relation to other brachiopods of the time.  Also one finding them does not since most that are found are compacted or partials.  This specimen somewhat demonstrates this though part of its shell/imprint is missing.


These next images are of a different Leptaena waldronensis as one might tell with the different lighting used.  Also some of these images were not stacked with Helicon Focus software. 




Creatures existed in the Middle Silurian wild time.