Microdictyon

A picture published with the record for Microdictyon. What it shows has not been checked.

Smithsonian Institution · CC0 · via Smithsonian. 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
OnychophoraPBDB
Diet
grazerPBDB
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB
Vision
well-developedPBDB

Time the record covers

At least 14 million years on record.

The record covers at least 521 Mya to 506.5 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 538.8 Mya to 497 Mya.

Cambrian — about 97 of 97 occurrencesCambrian540–538 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences538–537 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences537–535 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences535–534 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences534–532 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences532–531 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences531–529 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences529–528 Mya — about 1 occurrence528–527 Mya — about 2 occurrences527–525 Mya — about 2 occurrences525–524 Mya — about 2 occurrences524–522 Mya — about 2 occurrences522–521 Mya — about 4 occurrences521–519 Mya — about 14 occurrences519–518 Mya — about 15 occurrences518–516 Mya — about 15 occurrences516–515 Mya — about 11 occurrences515–514 Mya — about 6 occurrences514–512 Mya — about 4 occurrences512–511 Mya — about 2 occurrences511–509 Mya — about 2 occurrences509–508 Mya — about 2 occurrences508–506 Mya — about 5 occurrences506–505 Mya — about 6 occurrences505–503 Mya — about 1 occurrence503–502 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences502–501 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences501–499 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences499–498 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences498–496 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences521 Mya506.5 Mya539.6 Mya496.2 Mya

97 occurrences of Microdictyon 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

97 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

27 formations

Kuonamka — 70.74°N, 112.98°EKuonamka — 70.22°N, 113.70°EYuanshan — 25.68°N, 102.17°EYuanshan — 24.84°N, 102.41°EYuanshan — 24.80°N, 102.58°EYuanshan — 25.40°N, 103.38°EYuanshan — 25.72°N, 103.99°EYuanshan — 24.00°N, 102.00°EParara — 34.70°S, 137.71°EParara — 34.06°S, 138.02°EParara — 34.73°S, 137.63°EAjax Limestone — 30.59°S, 138.33°EYu'anshan — 25.33°N, 103.50°EYu'anshan — 25.55°N, 102.40°EYu'anshan — 24.77°N, 102.58°EDengying — 33.67°N, 109.46°EWirrapowie Limestone — 30.79°S, 139.14°EShuijingtuo — 32.51°N, 107.86°EShuijingtuo — 34.32°N, 108.70°EShabakty — 43.47°N, 69.87°EShabakty — 43.60°N, 69.45°ECampito — 37.72°N, 117.33°WPuerto Blanco — 30.42°N, 111.93°WBastion — 74.10°N, 23.00°WBastion — 74.35°N, 22.77°WLower Comley — 52.56°N, 2.76°WMernmerna Formation — 31.00°S, 139.26°EMernmerna Formation — 31.01°S, 139.24°EMernmerna — 30.79°S, 139.14°EBrigus — 45.77°N, 60.29°WWeymouth — 41.95°N, 71.28°WParara Limestone — 34.92°S, 137.80°EBeshtash — 42.17°N, 72.00°EHenson Gletscher — 82.17°N, 39.67°WHenson Gletscher — 82.17°N, 40.40°WGuojiaba — 32.45°N, 107.33°EKaili — 27.00°N, 107.00°EHartshill — 52.52°N, 1.46°WWades Lane — 45.08°N, 66.75°W

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The named rock units Microdictyon has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 3 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed.

Microdictyon and its relatives

Cambrian

Where Microdictyon and its relatives were recorded in the Cambrian.

Found in the same rock

600 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 83 sites for Microdictyon, 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

32 references

Each of the 97 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. 20 further references are not listed. 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 Microdictyon

Source
Smithsonian
Credit
Smithsonian Institution
Licence
CC0 — this site’s default, not the record’s
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

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

Keep going

What may have been alongside itOnychophora through timeFormations of the CambrianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Bengston et al. 1981