Acanthodes
“A fossil discovered near Hamilton, Kansas in the Upper Carboniferous Hamilton Formation, and published in 2014 as Acanthodes bridgei was so well-preserved that traces of its eye tissue were sufficient to establish that Acanthodes had both rod and cone photoreceptor cells, and thus profited from color vision
“
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#fish friday #acanthodes #paleoart
Foreyia maxkuhni
I had different plans for this fish friday. But switzerland threw a wrench in my plans. An adorable new coelacanth wrench!
Found in the swiss alpes at 2,740 altitude (you know, exactly where you expect to encounter a fish (when you are a paleonthologist))
Chritian Obrist discovered a severely well preserved fossil of this unusual coelacanth
You can even see the different skin textures.
Since its actual discovery,
Lionel Cavin
from the university of Geneve put the Fossil through CT scans, revealing astonishingly detailed insides and outsides of this fish. Foreyia lived apprx. 240 million years ago in the triassic period. Other than its recent cousin, it didnt live in the deep depts of the ocean, but probably prefered the brighter, warmer waters of the Muschelkalk reefs.
You can find the complete study at nature com with the article number s41598-017-13796-0
Today for Fish friday I collected a haunting of Eugaleaspidiformes. Also known as “ancient seaghosts” as of late ;)
Left to right
Top row: Sinogaleaspis, Nochelaspis
Middle row: Tridenaspis, Eugaleaspis, Anjiaspis, Dunyu
Bottom row: Shuyu, Pterogonaspis, Yunnanogaleaspis
(all of them are not to scale to one another)
I kind of would love to see this as a CD cover. But I will for sure have it printed.
Bothriolepis
A placoderm of the late devonian, and a fish so curious that it will probably get a second fish friday at one point, since I cant put all the neat details into one fast shotty FF post.
Bothriolepis lived on the ground of freshwater zones as a detritivore and is one of the better known placoderms due to one peculiar detail.
Its pectoral fins where armored and spike like. Whilst there is no 100% consensus on what these where usefull for, several possibilities are in discussion.
It may have used them to push its heavyly armored body off the ground. Especially usefull since it had lunglike airsacks and maybe the arms provided a proper “pushup” for takeoff in order for it to reach the surface and have a deep breath.
(It also had primitive gills, though)
It may have used the spikefins to burryitself in the mud, or pull itself a short part over the mud from puddle to puddle in times of drought.
Or it could have used them as a form of anchoring stilts when travelling or resting in a river with strong current.
But one thing is for sure, Bothriolepis pectoral fins where aurprisingly mobile for their armor encrusted state.
Whatever their use was, I am certain I know how they didnt work though…
GOTTAGOFAST!
imagine, though…
Was worried I wouldnt be able to finish anything in time for this weeks fish friday. I feared I would have to post that boring excel sheet of Ostracoderms instead.
But instead of that atrocity, I give you Hanyangaspis a flat but precious cephalaspidomorph of the galeaspida class. With up to 30cm it was one of the biggest jawless fish to ever grace the waters.
I gave it a sort of flatfishesque pattern cause just cause I can imagine it dashing into the ground and hide camouflaged to escape predation.
(I am sadly not sure on the timeframe of this cutie. Sources vary highly with some stating 416Ma and others
436 to 428 Ma)
Today on fish friday, I practised working with Winsor&Newton ink and a glas quil. I must say I am more than pleased with the result.
Another early fish from
412.3 to 409.1 Ma
Poraspis
Decided to do something different for fish friday.
This is Pteraspis. Pteraspidoform of the early Devonian and the most popular of all the Pteraspidoforms.
I crafted it out of airdrying clay and then digitally colored the photograph.
The raw clay figure:
Today for fish friday, I would love to show you more of one of my favorite families of jawless fish. The Furcacaudidae.
Or: “The fish that look like your six year old nice drew them” Important elements of a fish are present ( aside from jaws ) yet they are all “off” from what we know about fish.
Such as the lobes within the fins, the very high number of gillslits and the oddly planklinke shape. Important to point out is that the furcacaudidae whereso far the oldest fish discovered with an actual stomach cavity and guts instead of a simple tube. Canonia is pure speculation on my part, since we only ever found scales of this little oddball. A trend wich will continue during our journey.
I apologize for not being able to do something for last weeks fish friday. And this weeks fish friday will sadly also be not on the informative side.
Reason for this is that I am currently in a really tight and difficult spot and have little opportunity to actually research things properly. I will still try to return to my fish friday shedules, but sad as it makes me, in my position I can make no promises.
For this fish friday I went to the Aquazoo in Düsseldorf after it had been closed for 3 years of renovation. I saw some old faces, some new faces and had a great time personally. I also found some really old faces - beautyful fossils
Including a little preview to Fishfriday in two weeks ( have something else planned for fishfriday next week )
Bothriolepis
, a placoderm.
But then we come to the jawless fishes. And its a perfect example for why researching them is so hard:
I present you Thyestes. … No I swear its there! But I dont blame you! That rock is maybe as long as my smol grabby thumb. And if I didnt know what to look for …. I wouldnt see it either.
This is sadly the status quo for MANY jawless fish fossils, so reconstructing them is pretty hard. But someones gotta try, right?
NONSCIENTIFIC Sauroposeidon