Waptia fieldensis

Junnn11 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikidata/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
- WaptiaPBDB
- Diet
- detritivorePBDB, for Waptia
- Life habit
- nektobenthicPBDB, for Waptia
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Waptia
- Vision
- well-developedPBDB, for Waptia
Time the record covers
At most 13 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 509.7 Mya and 497 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
24 occurrences of Waptia fieldensis on record, most of them in the Cambrian. 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
24 occurrences- Cambrian100%
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
- Burgess Shale Formation · Chancellor Group23
- Langston Formation1
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The named rock units Waptia fieldensis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.
Waptia fieldensis and its relatives
CambrianWhere Waptia fieldensis and its relatives were recorded in the Cambrian.
Found in the same rock
138 taxa- Burgessia23 sites
- Diraphora23 sites
- Ehmaniella burgessensis23 sites
- Hazelia23 sites
- Liangshanella23 sites
- Marrella splendens23 sites
- Selkirkia columbia23 sites
- Wiwaxia corrugata23 sites
- Ottoia prolifica22 sites
- Pentagnostus praecurrens22 sites
- Yohoia22 sites
- Canadaspis perfecta21 sites
- Morania21 sites
- Naraoia compacta21 sites
- Scenella amii21 sites
- Sidneyia21 sites
- Haplophrentis carinatus20 sites
- Laggania19 sites
- Micromitra19 sites
- Pollingeria grandis19 sites
- Hurdia18 sites
- Lingulella18 sites
- Trilobita18 sites
- Takakkawia lineata17 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 24 sites for Waptia fieldensis, 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
2 references- Paleoecology of the Greater Phyllopod Bed community, Burgess Shale23
- Middle Cambrian arthropods from Utah1
Each of the 24 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. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content1

Picture of Waptia fieldensis
- Source
- Wikidata/Commons
- Credit
- Junnn11
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Waptia fieldensis 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 itWaptia through timeFormations of the CambrianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Walcott 1912