Osteolepididae

Osteolepididae is a family of primitive, fish-like tetrapodomorphs that lived during the Devonian period. The family is generally thought to be paraphyletic, with the traits that characterise the family being widely distributed among basal tetrapodomorphs and other osteichthyans. Some of the genera historically placed in Osteolepididae have more recently been assigned to the family Megalichthyidae, which appears to be a monophyletic group.

Osteolepididae

Nobu Tamura ( http://spinops.blogspot.com ) · CC BY 2.5 · 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
OsteolepididaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes

Time the record covers

At least 34 million years on record.

The record covers at least 393.47 Mya to 358.86 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 410.62 Mya to 346.7 Mya.

Devonian — about 42 of 43 occurrencesDevonianCarboniferous — about 1 of 43 occurrencesCarboniferous412–410 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences410–407 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences407–405 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences405–403 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences403–401 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences401–399 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences399–396 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences396–394 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences394–392 Mya — about 6 occurrences392–390 Mya — about 8 occurrences390–388 Mya — about 6 occurrences388–385 Mya — about 1 occurrence385–383 Mya — about 2 occurrences383–381 Mya — about 4 occurrences381–379 Mya — about 3 occurrences379–376 Mya — about 1 occurrence376–374 Mya — about 1 occurrence374–372 Mya — about 1 occurrence372–370 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences370–368 Mya — about 1 occurrence368–365 Mya — about 1 occurrence365–363 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences363–361 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences361–359 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences359–357 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences357–354 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences354–352 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences352–350 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences350–348 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences348–345 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences393.47 Mya358.86 Mya412 Mya345 Mya

43 occurrences of Osteolepididae on record, most of them in the Devonian. 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

43 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

24 formations

Rousay — 59.13°N, 3.15°WRousay — 58.91°N, 2.79°WRousay — 59.04°N, 2.87°WRousay — 59.24°N, 2.88°WRousay — 58.83°N, 3.11°WRousay — 59.16°N, 3.10°WLybster Flagstone — 58.47°N, 3.46°WLybster Flagstone — 57.83°N, 4.18°WLybster Flagstone — 57.68°N, 2.34°WLybster Flagstone — 57.64°N, 3.03°WNarva — 59.38°N, 28.19°EOberer Plattenkalk — 50.99°N, 7.15°EParting — 38.82°N, 106.74°WParting — 39.18°N, 106.82°WCatskill — 41.81°N, 77.78°WChemung — 41.68°N, 76.71°WParkes Siltstone — 23.99°S, 130.77°ECravens Peak Limestone — 23.40°S, 138.14°EGauja — 58.01°N, 25.38°EPärnu — 58.39°N, 24.50°EDankov-Lebedyan Beds — 52.97°N, 36.07°ELower Os’kin — 55.45°N, 90.06°EUpper Stromness Flagstones — 59.08°N, 3.32°WKetleri — 56.70°N, 22.13°EElbert — 37.54°N, 107.47°WCrosskirk Bay — 57.61°N, 3.12°WHam-Scarfskerry Flagstone — 58.62°N, 3.59°WBerriedale Flagstone — 58.57°N, 3.47°WMey Flagstone — 58.60°N, 3.53°WTērvete — 56.46°N, 23.25°EOld Red Sandstone — 51.50°N, 2.78°WKush Yeilagh — 36.85°N, 55.35°ETaldybulak — 41.31°N, 76.57°E

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The named rock units Osteolepididae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 6 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Osteolepididae and its relatives

Devonian

Where Osteolepididae and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.

Found in the same rock

229 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 42 sites for Osteolepididae, 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

19 references

Each of the 43 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. 7 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 Osteolepididae

Credit
Nobu Tamura ( http://spinops.blogspot.com )
Licence
CC BY 2.5
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Osteolepididae 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 itOsteolepidida through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Cope 1887