Podocopida
The Podocopida are an order of ostracods in the subclass Podocopa. It is the most diverse of the five orders of ostracods, and the only one with freshwater species. The group also has a rich fossil record.

Markus Lindholm, Anders Hobæk, Norsk institutt for vannforskning · CC BY 3.0 · 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
- PodocopaPBDB
- Diet
- detritivore, grazerPBDB
- Life habit
- epifaunalPBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Ostracoda
- Vision
- limitedPBDB, for Ostracoda
- Environment
- marinePBDB, for Ostracoda
Time the record covers
At least 477 million years on record.
The record covers at least 477.1 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 486.4 Mya to 0 Mya.
12,000+ occurrences of Podocopida on record. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. 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
12,000 occurrences read- Ordovician2%
- Silurian1%
- Devonian6%
- Carboniferous5%
- Permian32%
- Early Triassic4%
- Middle Triassic2%
- Late Triassic1%
- Early Jurassic13%
- Middle Jurassic3%
- Late Jurassicunder 1%
- Early Cretaceous3%
- Late Cretaceous2%
- Paleocene1%
- Eocene3%
- Oligocene3%
- Miocene15%
- Pliocene1%
- Pleistocene1%
- Holoceneunder 1%
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. The read hit its cap, so every figure above is a floor and the shares are of the occurrences read. More on what this infers.
Found in
at least 435 formations
- Changxing Formation1,390
- Gliwice Formation574
- Holmwood Formation487
- Qixia Formation426
- Jurensismergel Formation408
- Naujoji Akmené Formation156
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The named rock units Podocopida has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. The read hit its cap, so each count is a floor. 411 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 2,472 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Found in the same rock
2,363 taxa- Bairdia84 sites
- Crinoidea75 sites
- Glomospira38 sites
- Healdia38 sites
- Paraparchites38 sites
- Echinoidea35 sites
- Rastidiscus sp.35 sites
- Eomarginifera longispinus33 sites
- Tolypammina32 sites
- Plectogyra28 sites
- Bryozoa27 sites
- Bythocypris27 sites
- Cladochonus27 sites
- Graphiadactyllis27 sites
- Platycrinites27 sites
- Endothyra23 sites
- Aparchites22 sites
- Bollia22 sites
- Crurithyris urei22 sites
- Salopina lunata22 sites
- Protochonetes ludloviensis21 sites
- Ammodiscus20 sites
- Cavellina20 sites
- Craniops20 sites
The Paleobiology Database records at least 499 sites for Podocopida, and this reads 240 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
at least 392 references- The Changhsingian ostracodes from Meishan, Changxing, Zhejiang626
- Middle Miocene ostracods of the Fore-Carpathian Depression (Central Paratethys, southwestern Poland)574
- Late Miocene ostracod assemblages from eastern Mediterranean coral reef complexes (central Crete, Greece)490
- Ostracode and foraminiferal taxonomy and paleoecology of the Holmwood Shale, northern Perth Basin, Western Australia487
- Die Grenzziehung Unter-/Mitteljura (Toarcium/Aalenium) bei Wittnau und Fuentelsaz [Determinig the boundary between Toarcium/Aalenium near Wittnau and Fuentelsaz]471
- Ostracoden aus dem Lias der Kalkalpen Bayerns und Nordtirols409
- Ostracods (Crustacea) through the Permian-Triassic boundary in South China: the Meishan stratotype (Zhejiang Province)334
- Taxonomic names, in Ostracods (Crustacea) through the Permian-Triassic boundary in South China: the Meishan stratotype (Zhejiang Province)270
- Ostracods and fore-reef sedimentology of the Frasnian-Famennian boundary beds in Kielce (Holy Cross Mountains, Poland)261
- A re-examination of the Pliensbachian and Toarcian Ostracoda of Zambujal, west-central Portugal228
- Ostracods (Crustacea) associated with microbialites across the Permian-Triassic boundary in Dajiang (Guizhou Province, south China)205
- Ostracode fauna from Lower Permian Chihsia Formation of Guangping in Datian, Fujian199
Each of the 12,000 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. That read hit its cap, so each count is a floor. 380 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 Podocopida
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Markus Lindholm, Anders Hobæk, Norsk institutt for vannforskning
- Licence
- CC BY 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Podocopida 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
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Podocopida”
- 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 itPodocopa through timeThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Sars 1866