GEOL 126 Lab 3: Fossils as the remnants of once living organisms

Week of January 28th, 2018

Introduction

Last week, you went to the California Science center, and looked at (and hopefully touched!)
some extant organisms. Your lab asked you to imagine what would happen to these organisms if
they were to be fossilized. What would the fossils look like? What sort of environment would
these organisms preserve in? For this lab, you will be taking the knowledge you gathered about
the preservation probability of extant animals and apply it to the fossil record.

In the lecture, you learned that there are three major types of fossils: body, trace, and chemical.
You can further classify fossils based on their preservation method— or how the remains or an
organism become a fossil. Listed below are the preservation styles you will be learning about in
class:

Unaltered remains: Body fossils that have not changed significantly since the death of an
organism.
Permineralization: Occurs when a fossil’s vacant pore spaces have been filled-in with minerals.
Mold: Forms when minerals dissolve away, leaving behind a vacant space in the shape of the
original fossil; this vacant space is called a “mold”.
Replacement: the secondary replacement of the original mineral by another mineral.
Cast: Occurs when a vacant mold becomes filled with sediment like sand or mud, creating a
fossil made of sand or mud.
Carbonization: Occurs when a fossil is preserved as a thin film of carbon, similar to coal.
Trace fossils: The preservation of behavior, such as impressions, burrows, tubes, tunnels, and
track ways; trace fossils don’t preserve the animals themselves or even the shells of animals.

Preservation style can tell scientists a lot about the environment an organism lived in, along with
what the organism was, and what role it played in said environment. All this information is
important in recreating and understanding past ecosystems. However, this lab will also illustrate
how incomplete the fossil record really is. More than 99% of all species that ever lived are now
extinct, and less than one-10th of 1% of that number have become fossils. Even less have been
discovered, and natural processes like erosion can cause fossils to get destroyed before they can
be.

Therefore, reconstructing the past is not at all easy. There is a lot of missing information, and
even more dubious information being debated. For this lab, you will be looking at fossils and
thinking about some common questions scientists need to take into consideration when studying
fossils, such as: “How was this fossil preserved?”; “What can this fossil tell me about the
environment this organism lived in?”; and “What information may be missing?”.
 Station 1

1. There are three different fossils at this station: A fish fossil, coprolites (or fossilized
feces), and gizzard stones (ingested stones found in the stomachs of some animals).
Below, identify each fossil as either a body or trace fossil:

Fish fossil: ______________________________________

Coprolite: ______________________________________

Gizzard Stone: ___________________________________

2. Explain your reasoning behind assigning each fossil as either a trace or a body fossil.

3. Coprolites are useful fossils used to help identify what sort of diet an extinct organism
may have had. For example, you can sometimes find pieces of bone within some
carnivorous animals coprolites. Gizzard stones are ingested stones used to help certain
animals digest food. Gizzard stones are typical in herbivorous animals, like sauropod
dinosaurs, who made need help digesting more hardy plant matter. Draw both a coprolite
and gizzard stone and compare their morphologies.
 Station 2

1. Specimen 1 is an example of an external mold, or the impression of an organism left over

after the organism has been buried. How might molds be preserved in the fossil record?

2. Specimen 2 looks very similar to the Specimen 1 mold. In fact, this fossil is a cast of a
similar organism. Casts form when molds are infilled by sediment and lithified. Think
back to lab one: What type of sediment/grain size is making up this cast? Circle on the
chart below:

3. Specimen 3 is an example of fossil resin, or amber. Amber is formed when the sticky
syrup of a plant hardens. Some organisms can get stuck in this syrup before it hardens,
and end up as unaltered remains in the fossil record. What sized organisms would you
expect to find in amber? Can you see any organisms in the specimen at this station?

4. Specimens 4 and 5 are examples of replacement. When an organism is buried, mineral

rich groundwater slowly replaces the minerals that make up the original remains of the
organism. Specimen box 4 has brachiopods composed of calcite, which is what made up
the shell of the organism when it was alive. Specimen box 5 has brachiopods that have
 hade their calcite shell replaced by the mineral pyrite. Compare the specimen to the piece
of pyrite provided. How do we know this specimen was permineralized by pyrite?

5. Specimen 6 is a fossilized ammonite. Of the fossilization methods you learned about,

what method does this ammonite fossil fall under?

Station 3

1. Specimen 1 and 2 are compression fossils of leaves. Draw one of the leaves below. Note
that the leaves of specimen 2 are black, and somewhat shiny. Why might that be?

2. Specimen 3, 4 and 5 are examples of petrified wood. Under a microscope, you can still
see the structure of the cells that once made up the wood. The multiple colors come from
different mineral filling in different empty spaces both between and within the cells.
Which fossilization process produced these petrified wood samples? (Look at the
introduction section of your lab).
 Station 4

Here we have a hunk of coal, which can be classified as a chemical fossil. Coal is formed when
dead plant material decays into peat, and undergoes heating and pressurization after being
buried. Below is a diagram of this process:

1. Pick up the piece of coal. Does its weight surprise you? Why might this be? Look at the
figure above, and try to identify what is being loss when peat turns to coal.

2. Next, weigh the leaf provided. To weigh an object using the scale, make sure it is turned
on and the screen displays a weight of zero when nothing is on it. If the scale is not
displaying zero, press the “ON/ZERO” button until it does. Once the scale is zeroed,
simply place the leaf on top. Record its weight below. (make sure to add the units!)

3. Next, weigh the piece of coal. Take the leaf off the scale and zero the scale again. Once
the scale is zeroed, place the coal on the top. Record its weight below.

4. How many leaves does it take to produce this hunk of coal? Show your math.
 Station 5

Plants and animals are not the only creatures that can leave behind fossils, single celled
organisms can as well! These organisms can sometimes form microbial mats, which are living
communities of bacteria and other microorganisms visible to the naked eye. You can find these
communities in some modern day hot springs! Microbial mats can be highly mineralized, and
form layered structures. These structures can preserve in the fossil record.

1. In the petri dishes, we have two modern microbial mats. Petri dish A is a fresh microbial
mat, and petri dish B is a microbial mat that has been dried out. Compare and contrast to
two below and sketch the fresh microbial mat.

2. Specimen 1 is an example of what evidence of these microbial mats look like in the fossil
record. Would this be an example of a body or trace fossil?

3. The specimens you just looked at were formed from bacterial communities. Specimen 2
is an example of a similar structure (called a stromatolite) formed by a cyanobacterial
community. Theses structures can be preserved for incredibly long times. In fact,
Specimen 2 is upwards of 800 million year old! Draw the stromatolite below.
 Station 6

1. Specimen 1 is a fossilized crinoid that is still mostly intact. Crinoids are marine animals
that are closely related to starfish and sea urchins. Today, most crinoids live . Below,
sketch the fossil. Review the figure above and label on you sketch what has been
preserved. Is the fossil depicting what the crinoid would have looked like in life (are the
parts preserved still connected)?

2. Specimen 2 shows a less intact fossilized crinoid. What part of the crinoid is still intact?
What are the disk like structures sitting in the box with it?

3. Specimen 3 is an example of how crinoids typically get preserved. Why might some
crinoids preserve articulated, and some preserve disarticulated? (Think about the
environments where they live)
 Station 7

1. At this station, we have 4 animals: Specimen 1 is a starfish, Specimen 2 is a sea urchin,

Specimen 3 are disarticulated shells of some brachiopods, and Specimen 4 is a horseshoe
crab. Look at the diagrams below and rank which ones would be more likely to be
preserved articulated, and which would have the most bits preserved separately (as well
as the most pieces). Justify your answer.
 Station 8

1. Here you are looking at a modern coral skeleton, and a fossilized coral skeleton.
Draw both and compare the similarities. Are you able to identify all the parts of
the in the fossilized coral that you can see in the modern skeleton?

2. Here we have a modern brachiopod and a fossil brachiopod. The fleshy “tail”
sticking out of the brachiopod shell is its muscular foot, used to burrow in the
sand. Would the foot be preserved as a body fossil typically? Could the foot leave
behind any other fossil trace? If so, what might that be?

3. Here we have a leaf fossil and modern leaf. Think about how fragile a leaf is.
What environments or scenarios might be necessary to preserve a leaf in the fossil
record?
 Station 9

1. How do scientist identify specific fossils to once alive animals? How do we know what
organisms are closely related to one another? In the absence of DNA, scientist can you
morphological differences in the anatomy to identify fossils to specific animals. Here, we
have a cow jaw and some fish jaws. Sketch both below.

2. The elements you just drew are dentary bones, which make up the lower jaw of an
animal. Here are two diagrams of a fish and cow skull. What are some differences in the
lower jaws of the two animals? How many bones make up the lower jaw of the fish?
How about the cow? Do both animal’s jaws attach to the skull using the same bones?
Which one would most likely preserve in the fossil record, and why?