Rensselaeria

via iDigBio · CC0 · via iDigBio. 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
- RensselaeriinaePBDB
- Diet
- suspension feederPBDB, for Terebratulida
- Life habit
- low-level epifaunalPBDB, for Terebratulida
- Motility
- stationaryPBDB, for Terebratulida
- Vision
- blindPBDB, for Rhynchonellata
- Environment
- marinePBDB, for Lophophorata
Time the record covers
At least 19 million years on record.
The record covers at least 413.02 Mya to 393.47 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 419.62 Mya to 387.95 Mya.
11 occurrences of Rensselaeria 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
11 occurrences- Devonian100%
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
6 formations
- Gydo Formation · Bokkeveld Group3
- Oriskany Sandstone Formation2
- Voorstehoek Formation · Bokkeveld Group2
- Dalhousie Shale Formation1
- Connelly Conglomerate Formation1
- McColley Canyon Formation1
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The named rock units Rensselaeria has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Rensselaeria and its relatives
DevonianWhere Rensselaeria and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.
Found in the same rock
228 taxa- Crinoidea7 sites
- Actinopteria6 sites
- Nuculites6 sites
- Orbiculoidea6 sites
- Palaeoneilo6 sites
- Tentaculites6 sites
- Anchiopella5 sites
- Australospirifer5 sites
- Burmeisteria5 sites
- Grammysia5 sites
- Metacryphaeus (Metacryphaeus) caffer5 sites
- Nuculana5 sites
- Acrospirifer4 sites
- Burmeisteria (Digonus) noticus4 sites
- Chonetes4 sites
- Conularia4 sites
- Costispirifer4 sites
- Hyolithes4 sites
- Leptostrophia4 sites
- Meristella4 sites
- Modiomorpha4 sites
- Orthoceras4 sites
- Schellwienella4 sites
- Australocoelia3 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 11 sites for Rensselaeria, 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
6 references- Preliminary catalogue and report on the biostratigraphy and palaeogeographic distribution of the Bokkeveld fauna5
- Paleoecology of the Oriskany Sandstone and equivalents of the Appalachian Basin2
- Great Basin Lower Devonian Brachiopoda1
- Brachiopods of the Lower Devonian Rocks at Highland Mills, New York1
- The correlation of certain Devonian faunas of Easter and Western Gaspe1
- Early Devonic history of New York and eastern North America. Part 21
Each of the 11 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 Rensselaeria
- Source
- iDigBio
- Credit
- via iDigBio
- Licence
- CC0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Rensselaeria 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.
This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.
Keep going
What may have been alongside itRensselaeriinae through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0.