Riedaster reicheli
Riedaster reicheli is an extinct species of starfish in the family Astropectinidae, and the only species in the genus Riedaster. Riedaster reicheli was first described by Kutscher and Röper in 1999 from a three-dimensional body fossil. Its type locality is Papierschiefer, which is in a shallow subtidal mudstone in the Papierschiefer Formation in the Ried district of Germany. It is the type species of the genus Riedaster and dates back to the Late Jurassic.
Ghedoghedo · CC BY-SA 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
- RiedasterPBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Astropectinidae
- Life habit
- semi-infaunal, solitaryPBDB, for Astropectinidae
- Motility
- slow-movingPBDB, for Astropectinidae
- Vision
- limitedPBDB, for Asteroidea
- Environment
- marinePBDB, for Astropectinidae
Time the record covers
At most 4.2 million years on record.
The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 149.2 Mya and 145.06 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.
1 occurrence of Riedaster reicheli on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. 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
1 occurrences- Late Jurassic100%
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
1 formation
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The named rock units Riedaster reicheli has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.
Riedaster reicheli and its relatives
Late JurassicWhere Riedaster reicheli and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.
Found in the same rock
1 taxonThe Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Riedaster reicheli, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.
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
1 referenceEach of the 1 occurrence 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. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Riedaster reicheli
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Ghedoghedo
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 3.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Riedaster”
- 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 itRiedaster through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Kutscher and Röper 1999