Eryon

Eryon is an extinct genus of decapod crustaceans from the Late Jurassic of Germany. Its remains are known from the Solnhofen limestone. It reached a length of around 10 cm (3.9 in), and may have fed on particulate matter on the sea bed. It went extinct sometime after the Late Jurassic, which ended approximately 145 million years ago (Ma). There is no specific date for the extinction of the Eryon genus itself mentioned in the records, only that its existence is confined to the fossil records of the Late Jurassic period.

Eryon

Didier Descouens · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
EryonidaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Decapoda
Life habit
infaunalPBDB, for Polychelida
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Malacostraca
Vision
well-developedPBDB, for Malacostraca

Time the record covers

At least 50 million years on record.

The record covers at least 199.5 Mya to 149.2 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 201.4 Mya to 143.1 Mya.

Late Triassic — about 0 of 17 occurrencesEarly Jurassic — about 7 of 17 occurrencesEarly JurassicMiddle Jurassic — about 3 of 17 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 7 of 17 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 0 of 17 occurrences203–201 Mya — about 1 occurrence201–199 Mya — about 1 occurrence199–197 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences197–194 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences194–192 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences192–190 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences190–188 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences188–186 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences186–184 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences184–182 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences182–180 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences180–178 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences178–176 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences176–174 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences174–172 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences172–170 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences170–168 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences168–166 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences166–164 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences164–162 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences162–160 Mya — about 2 occurrences160–158 Mya — about 1 occurrence158–156 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences156–154 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences154–152 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences152–150 Mya — about 1 occurrence150–148 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences148–146 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences146–144 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences144–142 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences199.5 Mya149.2 Mya203 Mya142 Mya

17 occurrences of Eryon on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

17 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

4 formations

Insektenmergel — 47.47°N, 8.23°EOxford Clay — 52.33°N, 0.09°WTerrain à Chailles — 47.65°N, 6.28°ESolnhofen — 48.90°N, 11.11°E

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The named rock units Eryon has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 13 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Eryon and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Eryon and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

93 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Eryon, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

10 references

Each of the 17 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Eryon

Credit
Didier Descouens
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
Commercial use
the licence does not allow it

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itEryonidae through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Desmarest 1822