Fossil Crinoids

About this book

Crinoids have graced the oceans for more than 500 million years. Among the most attractive fossils, crinoids had a key role in the ecology of marine communities through much of the fossil record, and their remains are prominent rock forming constituents of many limestones. This is the first comprehensive volume which brings together their form and function, classification, evolutionary history, occurrence, preservation and ecology. The main part of Fossil Crinoids is devoted to assemblages of intact fossil crinoids, which are described in their geological setting in 23 chapters ranging from the Ordovician to the Tertiary. The final chapter deals with living sea lilies and feather stars. Fossil Crinoids is exquisitely illustrated with abundant photographs and line drawings of crinoids from sites around the world. This authoritative account recreates a fascinating picture of fossil crinoids for palaeontologists, geologists, evolutionary and marine biologists, ecologists and amateur fossil collectors.

Contents

Prelude
Introduction

1. Crinoid form and function
2. Systematics, phylogeny and evolutionary history
3. Fossil occurrence
4. Taphonomy
5. Ecology and ecological interactions
6. Middle Ordovician Trenton Group of New York, USA
7. Middle Ordovician of the Lake Simcoe area of Ontario, Canada
8. Upper Ordovician of the Cincinnati, Ohio area, USA
9. Silurian of Gotland, Sweden
10. Middle Silurian Rochester Shale of western New York, USA, and southern Ontario, Canada
11. Scyphocrinitids from the Silurian-Devonian boundary of Morocco
12. Lower Devonian Manlius/Coeymans Formation of central New York, USA
13. Lower Devonian Hunsrück Slates of Germany
14. Middle Devonian Windom Shale of Vincent, New York, USA
15. Middle Devonian Arkona Shale of Ontario and Silica Shale of Ohio, USA
16. Lower Mississippian Hampton Formation at LeGrand, Iowa, USA
17. Lower Mississippian Burlington Limestone along the Mississippi Valley in Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri, USA
18. Lower Mississippian Edwardsville Formation at Crawfordsville, Indiana, USA
19. Upper Pennsylvania LaSalle Member, Bond Formation of central Illinois, USA
20. Permian
21. Triassic Muschelkalk of central Europe
22. Pentacrinites from the Lower Jurassic of the Dorset coast of southern England
23. Lower Jurassic Posidonia Shales of southern Germany
24. Middle Jurassic of southern England
25. Middle Jurassic of northern Switzerland
26. Upper Jurassic Solnhofen Plattenkalk of Bavaria, Germany
27. Uintacrinus beds of the Upper Cretaceous Niobrara formation, Kansas, USA
28. Tertiary
29. Recent

Appendices
Bibliography
Index

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