Lepidocystis

Lepidocystis is a Palaeozoic genus of imbricate lepidocystoid eocrinoid, closely related to Kinzercystis. It bore a stalk, with which it attached to firm substrates; and brachioles arising as lateral branches from its arms.

Lepidocystis

Unknown author Unknown author · CC BY 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
LepidocystidaePBDB
Diet
suspension feederPBDB
Life habit
intermediate-level epifaunalPBDB
Motility
stationary, attachedPBDB
Environment
marinePBDB, for Echinodermata

Time the record covers

At least 150 million years on record.

The record covers at least 509.7 Mya to 358.86 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 515.3 Mya to 306 Mya.

Cambrian — about 6 of 7 occurrencesCambrianOrdovician — about 0 of 7 occurrencesSilurian — about 0 of 7 occurrencesDevonian — about 0 of 7 occurrencesCarboniferous — about 1 of 7 occurrencesCarboniferous519–512 Mya — about 3 occurrences512–505 Mya — about 3 occurrences360–353 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences353–345 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences345–338 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences338–331 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences331–324 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences324–316 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences316–309 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences309–302 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences509.7 Mya358.86 Mya519 Mya302 Mya

7 occurrences of Lepidocystis on record, most of them in the Cambrian. 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

7 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

2 formations

Kinzers — 40.04°N, 76.31°WKinzers — 40.00°N, 76.73°WKinzers — 41.04°N, 78.29°WKinzers — 39.98°N, 76.76°WDrywood — 38.00°N, 93.00°W

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The named rock units Lepidocystis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Lepidocystis and its relatives

Cambrian

Where Lepidocystis and its relatives were recorded in the Cambrian.

Found in the same rock

81 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 7 sites for Lepidocystis, 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

5 references

Each of the 7 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 content1

Picture of Lepidocystis

Credit
Unknown author Unknown author
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Lepidocystis was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were 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 itLepidocystidae through timeFormations of the CambrianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Foerste 1938