Placiphorella velata
Placiphorella velata, commonly known as the veiled chiton or jockey-cap chiton, is a species of chiton found in rocky crevices from Alaska to Baja California.

Cjziems · 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- Also called
- veiled chitonPBDB
- Sits inside
- PlaciphorellaPBDB
- Diet
- grazerPBDB, for Polyplacophora
- Life habit
- epifaunalPBDB, for Polyplacophora
- Motility
- facultatively mobile, attachedPBDB, for Polyplacophora
- Vision
- limitedPBDB, for Polyplacophora
- Environment
- marine,brackishPBDB, for Polyplacophora
Time the record covers
At most 2.6 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 2.58 Mya and 0 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
7 occurrences of Placiphorella velata on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. 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- Pleistocene100%
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
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The named rock units Placiphorella velata has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Placiphorella velata and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Placiphorella velata and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
267 taxa- Callistochiton crassicostatus4 sites
- Mopalia ciliata4 sites
- Mopalia muscosa4 sites
- Cryptochiton stelleri3 sites
- Mopalia lignosa3 sites
- Stenoplax magdalenensis3 sites
- Acteocina culcitella2 sites
- Alia carinata2 sites
- Amphissa versicolor2 sites
- Antisabia panamensis2 sites
- Californiconus californicus2 sites
- Callianax biplicata2 sites
- Callianax pedroana2 sites
- Calliostoma ligatum2 sites
- Chaetopleura gemma2 sites
- Chlamys hastata2 sites
- Chlamys rubida2 sites
- Chlorostoma montereyi2 sites
- Cumingia californica2 sites
- Cymakra aspera2 sites
- Diodora aspera2 sites
- Epilucina californica2 sites
- Eulithidium pulloides2 sites
- Euspira lewisii2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 4 sites for Placiphorella velata, 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- Fossil chitons of Western North America3
- Late Pleistocene molluscan faunas from upper terraces of the Palos Verdes Hills, California1
- Geology of San Nicolas Island, California1
- Report on Pleistocene Molluscan Fauna at Capistrano Beach, Orange County, Calif1
- An unreported exposure of the San Pedro Pleistocene1
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 Placiphorella velata
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Cjziems
- Licence
- CC BY 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Placiphorella velata was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.
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 itPlaciphorella through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Carpenter 1879