Watsonosteus fletti

Watsonosteus is an extinct genus of coccosteid arthrodire placoderm from the Late Givetian stage of the Middle Devonian period. Fossils are found in the Orkney Islands, Scotland. It was a small placoderm with a total body length of 57 cm (22 in), with the largest individuals reaching lengths of 1 m (39 in). It is one of the few arthrodires for which complete body fossils are known.

Watsonosteus fletti

Michael J. Newman · 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
Sits inside
WatsonosteusPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Arthrodira
Life habit
nektonicPBDB, for Arthrodira
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Arthrodira

Time the record covers

At most 5.7 million years on record.

The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 387.95 Mya and 382.31 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.

Devonian — about 1 of 1 occurrenceDevonian388–388 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences388–388 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences388–387 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences387–387 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences387–387 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences387–387 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences387–386 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences386–386 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences386–386 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences386–386 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences386–386 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences386–385 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences385–385 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences385–385 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences385–385 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences385–384 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences384–384 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences384–384 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences384–384 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences384–384 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences384–383 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences383–383 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences383–383 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences383–383 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences383–382 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences382–382 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences388.4 Mya381.8 Mya

1 occurrence of Watsonosteus fletti 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

1 occurrences

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

Last House — 58.64°N, 3.07°W

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The named rock units Watsonosteus fletti has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Watsonosteus fletti and its relatives

Devonian

Where Watsonosteus fletti and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.

Found in the same rock

4 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Watsonosteus fletti, 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 reference

Each 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 Watsonosteus fletti

Credit
Michael J. Newman
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Watsonosteus fletti 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.

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 itWatsonosteus through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Watson 1932