Paleozoic Life

Life forms in the Paleozoic

• The paleozoic begins with the appearance of fossils of
marine animals. For the first time, ocean animals that
have easily fossilized hard parts.
• The paleozoic contains the history of animal and plant
diversification in the oceans and colonization of land

Crinoids
 Important Paleozoic Invertebrates

• First we will examine the anatomical plans

of Trilobites, Brachiopods, Molluscs
(clams, snails and cephalopods),
Echinoderms (starfish, sea urchins and
especially crinoids), and Graptolites.
• Later we will look at corals and sponges
 Trilobite shell morphology
Arthropod – “jointed-leg”
Related to Horseshoe crabs
What other arthropods do you know of?

Varied niche, predators, scavengers or

filter feeders. Some swam, feeding on
plankton
Brachiopod morphology
Sessile benthic filter feeders related to bryozoans
 Articulate Brachiopods
Brachiopod life positions 1

Brachiopods sort of look like a clam. However, notice that

each valve is symmetrical about its middle line.
 Brachiopod life positions 2
Inarticulate Brachiopod

Lingula Infaunal sessile benthic filter feeders intertidal

 Bivalve morphology

Clams, Scallops Individual valve is not symmetrical about a middle line

Gastropod (snail) shapes
Cephalopod shell morphology
 Crinoid morphology

Stalked
echinoderm
related to
starfishes, sea
urchins, etc
 Graptolites
Related to ??? Often found in black shales, deep shelf waters, no other fossils

Great index fossils

 What was the Cambrian
Explosion?
• The Paleozoic is marked by the abrupt
appearance of animals with skeletons in the
rock record
– a mechanism that would trigger this event is not
agreed upon, but is surely due to a combination of
geologic and biologic factors
– Predators prominent
– shallow water, animals must be protected from UV.
 The Emergence of
Shelly Fauna
• Organisms with hard parts have many
advantages
– protection against UV rays, allowing animals to
move into shallower water
– helps prevent drying out in an intertidal environment
– provides protection against predators
 Small shelly fauna
Photos

A. Mollusk B. Sponge

Drawings

Late Proterozoic (Ediacaran) to Early Cambria, before trilobites.

 Cambrian Marine Community

• Many body plans are observed in Cambrian fossils,

more than in any other period
– trilobites – many niches, e.g. benthonic mobile sediment-
deposit feeders that crawled or swam across the sea floor
– brachiopods - primitive benthonic sessile suspension feeders
– archaeocyathids - benthonic sessile suspension feeders and
reef builders
 Invertebrates with hard parts

Brachiopods
Note how the valves have symmetry
Trilobites

Crinoids

Sponges
 The Burgess Shale Biota
• Consists of a rare preservation of soft-bodied
organisms – Mid Cambrian
– Some phyla near the basic stock from which
some present-day invertebrates have evolved
– Other unique and without issue
– current debate centers around how many phyla
arose and how many extinction events took place
in the Cambrian
 Charles Walcott’s Burgess Shale

-middle Cambrian shale in the Rockies of western Canada

 Anomalocaris
A huge predaor

Hallucigenia

Pikaia
A chordate!!! Sidneyia
Remarkable preservation of animals’ soft tissues, plus the first predator, Anomalocaris
Modern Brine Shrimp Artemia salina
Similar swimming mode to Anomalocaris?

Anomalocaris
A huge predaor
Marella, a trilobitomorph
or “Lace Crab”

Anomalocaris and
some known prey.
Bite marks on fossils
Leanchoilia--China

Leanchoilia--Burgess
Opabina
Interpreting Hallucigenia

Like the modern

Peripatus, moist forests
of Cameroon,
Discussion:
preadaptations to land if
food is present
 Pikaia
Totally unexpected find. Cartilage but no bone.
Jawless ancestor to fish, and us.
Maori legend of Pikea, the ancestor.
Lancelets in comparative anatomy

Pikaia – an early chordate!

from the Burgess Shale
Cambrian Trilobites

 
Paradoxides bohemicus
Barrande
YPM 72949
Cambrian, Etage C.
                       Koneprussy, Bohemia,
       
Czechoslovakia.
Archaeocyathids (sponges?)
Ordovician Marine Community
Note large Orthoceras • Vast epeiric seas
A Cephalopod Mollusk opened new marine
habitats
– bryozoans,
stromatoporoids, tabulate
and rugose coral reef
builders
– reefs with high diversity -
suspension feeders
– massive extinctions end
Ordovician, glaciation in
Gondwana & falling sea-
level
Cephalopods as
Index Fossils
 Bryozoans
•
Possibly related
to Brachiopods
•“Moss Animals”
•Filter Feeders
•Mostly marine
tropical
•Make hard
exoskeleton,
chitin or CaCO3
 Bryozoans
In fossils, just the exoskeleton is preserved
Halysites Tabulate Coral O-S
Stromatoporoid - Hydrozoan coral
or Sponge? -C - K
 http://www.yale.edu/ypmip/

 
Didymograptus denticulatus Berry

Graptolite YPM 20252

Early Ordovician, Marathon Ls.
Didymograptus bifidus zone, upper
Marathon, 14.5 ft below Marathon top,
                 section XVIII, bed of Alsate Creek, 3 mi W of
Picnic Picnic Grounds & 0.1 S54W of
                        Marathon, Brewster Co., Texas, USA.
      Collector: Berry, W.B.
 Silurian and Devonian Marine
Communities
• Rapid diversification and
recovery followed the
Ordovician mass extinction
– reef building by tabulate and
rugose corals
– NEW PREDATOR :
Eurypterids were Marine “Scorpions”
abundant Track ways in coastal sands
– Ammonoids evolved quickly Probably laid eggs as horseshoe crabs do
along the foreshore
and are important as index
fossils
– mass extinction at the end of
the Devonian collapsed the
massive reefs
Pterygotus
Rugose Corals – individual animals
Devonian Tabulate Corals
Favosites conicus Hall

 
YPM 7115
Early Devonian, Oriskany Sandstone. Loc.
C6644,
Cumberland, Allegany Co., Maryland, USA
Collector: Gordon, R.H. & Hartley, F.

         

                    Colonial
        
Brachiopod Leptaena rhomboidalis (Wilkens)

 
YPM 19154
Early Devonian, Helderberg Grp, New Scotland Ls.
Lower Helderberg, Indian Ladder, Thatcher State
Park, near New Salem, Albany Co., New York, USA.
                           Collector: Beecher, C.E.

                  
 
Phacops rana (Green)
YPM 6593
Middle Devonian,
Hamilton Grp.
Eighteen Mile Creek,
  
Erie Co., New York,
            
USA. Collector:
             Beecher, C.E.
     
 Carboniferous and Permian
Marine Communities
• Renewed diversity and
recovery with
adaptations mark the
Late Paleozoic marine
communities
– bryozoans and crinoids
reach their greatest
diversity
– patch reefs replace the
massive reefs of the
Devonian –TEMPS?
– fusulinid formanifera are
important index fossils
Types of Staked Echinoderms 1
Cystoids Anomalocystis cornutus

 
Hall
YPM 36413
Early Devonian,
Helderberg Grp. Lower
Helderberg, Jerusalem
      Hill, Herkimer Co., New
York, USA.
           
           
           
      
Types of Staked Echinoderms 2
Blastoids

Pentremites sulcatus

 
YPM 36130
Pennsylvanian, Gaptank Fm.
Unit 7 (27 ft thick), Section 32,
1.25 mi S60W of the Brooks
Ranch House, Glass
          Mountains, Pecos Co., Texas,
USA. Collector: Ross, C.A.
                
                
   
 Barycrinus hoveyi (Hall)
YPM 34788
Early Mississippian, Edwardsville Fm. Fragments on Field Trip
Crawfordsville, Montgomery Co., Stroudsburg PA
Indiana, USA. Collector: Bassett, D.A.
      
1888.

      
Types of Staked Echinoderms 3 - Crinoids
 Vertebrate Evolution
• Chordates have, during at least part of their
life, a notochord, dorsal hollow nerve chord,
and gill slits
– Vertebrates have backbones and are a sub-
phylum of chordates
– ancestors were soft-bodied and left few fossils
– a close relationship exists between echinoderms
and chordates and they may have shared a
common ancestor
 Fish
• Fish range from the Late Cambrian to
the present and consist of five classes
• Ostracoderms
• Placoderms
• Acanthodians
• Cartilaginous fish – sharks and rays
• Bony fish
Classes of fish through time
Ostracoderms- Jawless fish
Field Trip
Bony plates in Shf
Silurian High Falls at
Delaware Water Gap
Evolution of jaws
 Placoderms – first fish w jaws
Dunkleosteous (Dinichthys) a Devonian arthrodire
 Placoderm - Bothryolepis
• Today we will examine another Placoderm

• Named Bothryolepis

• It’s armor is similar to that of modern

South American catfishes that live in
shallow, fast moving, jungle streams in
South America
 Acanthodian Placoderm
a more usual body plan

Climatius, a Lower Devonian acanthodian

 Cartilagenous fishes: Fossil Shark

Cladoselache
fyleri, a 3-foot
shark, was one
of the top
predators in the
Devonian seas.
Bony Fishes (Osteichthys)
Ray-finned (Actinopterygians) and Lobe-finned (Sarcopterygians)
Rhipidistian fish

(Crossopterigian)

Field Trip Catskill fm.

Bones of early Amphibians
Similar skulls, teeth,
Bones in limbs.
Fish limbs not for walking
Hyneria lindae from Hyner, PA
http://www.lhup.edu/jway/rdhll/RedHill.htm
 Amphibians -
Vertebrates Invade the Land
• The first vertebrates
to live on land,
preceded by plants,
insects, and snails
• Barriers they had to
deal with:
– desiccation
– reproduction
– effects of gravity
– extraction of oxygen
by lungs rather than
gills
 Early Amphibian

Late Devonian Ichthyostega

Skull, teeth, backbone and tail are Rhiphidistian-like
 Labyrinthodont amphibian

Eryops, a carnivorous amphibian,

named for folds in teeth
Pennsylvania to Early Permian
 Middle Carboniferous - Evolution of
the Reptiles
The Land is Conquered
• The evolution of the
amniote egg freed reptiles
from the constraint of
returning to water to
reproduce
– amnion - liquid filled sac
surrounding the embryo
– allantois - waste sac
– a tough shell protects the
developing fetus
– reptiles were able to
colonize all parts of the land
 Evolution of the Reptiles
Warm
• The earliest reptiles are
from the Lower
Pennsylvanian Cool
– called Captorhinomorphs,
they were small, agile, and
probably fed on insects
– success due to advanced
egg, more advanced jaws
and teeth, and speed
– Later reptiles evolved from
this group by Permian
Skull structure in reptiles, temporalis muscle

Eury wide
An not, without
Syn united, together
Dia double

Function of
Early Therapsids Temporal
Openings
 Pelycosaurs

Discussion: Sail
herbivorous Edaphosaurus
function

Thermoregulation
Armor
Courtship

carnivorous Dimetrodon
 Evolution of the Reptiles
• Therapsids succeeded the pelycosaurs during the
Permian
– mammal-like reptiles that quickly evolved into herbivorous
and carnivorous forms
– they displayed fewer bones in the skull, enlargement of the
lower jawbone, differentiation of the teeth, and a more
vertical position of their legs
– therapsids may have been endothermic, which may help
explain their distribution over wide latitudes
• End Permian extinction eliminated about 66% of all
amphibians and reptiles
Late Permian therapsids
 Back to the early Paleozoic to consider plant evolution

Land Plant Evolution - Silurian

• Plants had the same water-to-land transition
problems that animals did
– vascular land plants have a tissue system to move water
– nonvascular plants do not have this system, and are usually
small and live in moist environments
– seedless vascular plants such as ferns closely resemble
green algae in their pigmentation, metabolism, and
reproductive cycle
– green algae have also been able to make the transition
from salt water to fresh water, leading some to believe that
modern terrestrial land plants evolved from them
Silurian and Devonian Floras
• The earliest land plants are from the Silurian
– small, simple leafless stalks with a spore-producing structure
at the tip (Rhynia drawing and modern Psilotum pictured)
– a rhizome (the underground part of the stem) transferred
water from the soil to the plant and anchored it
– leaves, roots, and secondary growth all followed during the
Devonian
• The evolution of the first seed allowed land plants
(“Seed Ferns”) to spread over all parts of the land
 Lepidodendron L Dev. – Penn.
A lycopod tree 90 – 100 feet tall

An important coal-former
Calamites, a huge horsetail rush
10-14 meters tall (Pennsylvanian)
Spenopsid L. Dev – E. Penns. Floras
(Horsetail Rush) Lycopsid (club moss)
Calamites shown Lepidodendron shown
• Source of coal
• Seedless vascular: Need
moisture to reproduce,
vulnerable to insect attack
– Lycopsids to 30m
branches at top; leaves
similar to palm
– Sphenopsids jointed
stem underground
rhizomes
• First Seed Ferns Late
Devonian West Virginia
seed ferns
L. Pennsylvanian – M. Permian
Floras

• Seed-bearing vascular
– Gymnosperm trees -
Cordaites, Glossopteris,
and others were able to
colonize large areas of
land
– many of these became
extinct in the Late
Permian; those that
survived were able to
tolerate the warmer and
drier climates
 Insects and other land arthropods
• Have a strong exoskeleton, impervious to
water so good for osmoregulation.
• Predation on plant spores probably a
strong selective pressure for seed
coatings.

 
Petalia sp.
YPM 29867
Late Jurassic,
          Kimmeridgian, Solnhofen
Ls. Solnhofen, Bavaria,
                West Germany.
               
     
 Permian Marine Extinction Event
• The greatest recorded mass extinction to affect Earth
occurred at the end of the Permian
– about 90% of all marine invertebrate species
– fusulinids, rugose and tabulate corals, many bryozoan and
brachiopod orders, and trilobites did not survive the end of
the Permian
– causes for this have been speculated to be:
• reduction in marine shelf as Pangaea formed
• global drop in sea level due to glaciation
• reduction in marine shelf due to regression
• climatic changes
Fusilinids, large for
ams
 Permian Extinctions
S. A. Bowring, et. al. (1998) U/Pb Zircon Geochronology and Tempo
of the End-Permian Mass Extinction. SCIENCE 280 :1039-1045

• The mass extinction at the end of the Permian was the most
profound in the history of life.

• U/Pb zircon data from south China place the Permian-Triassic

boundary at 251 mya.

• Strata intercalated with ash beds below the boundary:

Changhsingian pulse of the end-Permian extinction (loss of 85
percent of marine species) lasted less than 1 my.

• At Meishan, a negative excursion in 13C at the boundary had a

duration of 165,000 years or less, suggesting a catastrophic
addition of light carbon. GLOBAL FIRE!
 13C
• 12C and 13C are stable isotopes of Carbon
12C 98.89%
13C 1.11% in today’s atmosphere

Negative excursions mean 13C down or 12C up.

 13C
• Standard carbon in calcite from belemnites Pee
Dee Formation (abbreviated as PDB).
• The process of photosynthesis favors the lighter
form of carbon
• “If you recall from the above brief discussion of
the soot found in the … clay layer, it appears
that a significant portion of the land plants
burned; this would have released a great deal of
light carbon into the atmosphere”
Extinctions aligned

Extinction

Extinction

Extinction
 Major mass-extinction events
Asteroid Impact

Asteroid Impact
Asteroid Impact

Asteroid Impact

Supposedly due to glaciation

but it doesn’t line up with low water

Mention 26-30 my cycle of extinctions