File:Anomalocaris canadensis grasping claw, Burgess Shale.jpg
Original file (1,797 × 1,198 pixels, file size: 1.57 MB, MIME type: image/jpeg)
Captions
Summary edit
DescriptionAnomalocaris canadensis grasping claw, Burgess Shale.jpg |
Anomalocaris canadensis Whiteaves, 1892 grasping claw (~8.5 cm long), preserved as a carbonized film in slightly metamorphosed shale from the Middle Cambrian-aged Burgess Shale of southwestern Canada (YPM 35138, Yale University’s Peabody Museum, New Haven, Connecticut, USA). The Middle Cambrian-aged Burgess Shale is the most famous fossil deposit on Earth. It is located near the town of Field in Yoho National Park, southeastern British Columbia, western Canada. The deposit is famous for its spectacular soft-bodied preservation - the organisms have had their appendages & internal organs preserved. Many tens of thousands of fossils have been collected from the Burgess Shale Formation over the last century. Including known, but unnamed species, and excluding known or demonstrable junior synonyms, the Burgess Shale biota totals at least ~280 species. Many claim that Charles Walcott discovered the Burgess Shale Lagerstätte (as soft-bodied fossil deposits are called by paleontologists) in 1909. However, it was actually discovered in 1886 or 1888 by Richard McConnell, based on anomalocarid appendage material from Mt. Stephen, in the Campsite Cliff Member of the Burgess Shale Formation. The main collecting localities have been two quarries (Walcott Quarry & Raymond Quarry) on the western side of the ridge connecting Mt. Field and Wapta Mountain a little north-northeast of Field. Numerous other smaller localities have been identified in the same area & for many, many kilometers to the south. Collecting at the Burgess Shale was most intense in 1910-1917 (Charles Walcott), 1925-1930 (Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology), 1966-1967 (Geological Survey of Canada), and 1975-2000s (Royal Ontario Museum). Some of the most celebrated problematic fossil organisms from the Burgess Shale are the anomalocarids, the namesake of which is Anomalocaris canadensis Whiteaves, 1892. The genus name “Anomalocaris” means “strange shrimp”, which is ironically appropriate, because the name was given to fossil remains identified as shrimp bodies. But, anomalocarids are anything but shrimp. These creatures had medium-sized to large bodies (extrapolated up to ~3 meters long) with a head having a pair of grasping claws & short-stalked eyes & a pineapple ring-shaped mouth, plus a body with two lateral rows of swimming flaps. The first anomalocarid fossils (isolated grasping claws) were discovered in the 1880s from British Columbia’s Burgess Shale Formation. They were identified as shrimp bodies lacking heads (see this photo). In general, paleontologists didn’t recognize that these Anomalocaris fossils represented parts of a much larger organism. The true nature of the complete Anomalocaris organism wasn’t realized until very rare complete specimens were excavated from Burgess Shale quarries by the Royal Ontario Museum. The "headless shrimp" fossils turned out to be grasping claws at the head end of a large animal that could not be classified with any traditional arthropod group. New high-level taxa have been created to accommodate it (see Collins, 1996, Journal of Paleontology 70: 280-293). Classification: Arthropoda, Dinocarida, Radiodonta, Anomalocaridae Stratigraphy: Walcott Quarry Member, Burgess Shale Formation, Ptychagnostus praecurrens Interval-zone, lower Marjuman Stage, middle Middle Cambrian. Locality: Walcott Quarry, western side of ridge between Mt. Field & Wapta Mountain, north-northeast of the town of Field, southeastern British Columbia, southwestern Canada. |
Date | |
Source | Anomalocaris canadensis grasping claw (Burgess Shale Formation, Middle Cambrian; Walcott Quarry, above Field, British Columbia, Canada) |
Author | James St. John |
Licensing edit
- You are free:
- to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work
- to remix – to adapt the work
- Under the following conditions:
- attribution – You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
This image was originally posted to Flickr by jsj1771 at https://www.flickr.com/photos/47445767@N05/15113335009. It was reviewed on 21 September 2014 by FlickreviewR and was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the cc-by-2.0. |
21 September 2014
File history
Click on a date/time to view the file as it appeared at that time.
Date/Time | Thumbnail | Dimensions | User | Comment | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
current | 20:38, 21 September 2014 | 1,797 × 1,198 (1.57 MB) | Tillman (talk | contribs) | Transferred from Flickr via Flickr2commons |
You cannot overwrite this file.
File usage on Commons
There are no pages that use this file.
File usage on other wikis
The following other wikis use this file:
- Usage on ar.wikipedia.org
- Usage on de.wikipedia.org
- Usage on en.wikipedia.org
- Usage on es.wikipedia.org
- Usage on eu.wikipedia.org
- Usage on nl.wikipedia.org
- Usage on oc.wikipedia.org
- Usage on pl.wikipedia.org
- Usage on www.wikidata.org
- Usage on zh.wikipedia.org
Metadata
This file contains additional information such as Exif metadata which may have been added by the digital camera, scanner, or software program used to create or digitize it. If the file has been modified from its original state, some details such as the timestamp may not fully reflect those of the original file. The timestamp is only as accurate as the clock in the camera, and it may be completely wrong.
Width | 1,797 px |
---|---|
Height | 1,198 px |
Bits per component |
|
Compression scheme | Uncompressed |
Pixel composition | RGB |
Orientation | Normal |
Number of components | 3 |
Horizontal resolution | 300 dpi |
Vertical resolution | 300 dpi |
Data arrangement | chunky format |
Software used | Adobe Photoshop CS2 Macintosh |
File change date and time | 14:49, 20 September 2014 |
Color space | Uncalibrated |
Image width | 1,797 px |
Image height | 1,198 px |
Date and time of digitizing | 09:10, 27 November 2006 |
Date metadata was last modified | 10:49, 20 September 2014 |
IIM version | 2 |