Ascocerida

Ascocerida is an order of comparatively small nautiloids in the subclass Orthoceratoidea, known from Ordovician and Silurian sediments in Europe and North America. They are believed to have diverged from other orthoceratoids, possibly clinoceratids, during the Middle Ordovician, though fossils of them from this time are rare. While they suffered from the Late Ordovician Mass Extinction, they recovered in the Silurian and became extinct at the end of that period.

Ascocerida

Antonov · Public Domain · 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
MulticeratoideaPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Cephalopoda
Life habit
nektobenthicPBDB
Motility
fast-movingPBDB, for Cephalopoda
Vision
well-developedPBDB, for Cephalopoda
Environment
marinePBDB, for Cephalopoda

Time the record covers

At least 32 million years on record.

The record covers at least 457.3 Mya to 425 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 471.3 Mya to 422.7 Mya.

Ordovician — about 139 of 164 occurrencesOrdovicianSilurian — about 25 of 164 occurrencesSilurian472–471 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences471–469 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences469–467 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences467–466 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences466–464 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences464–462 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences462–460 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences460–459 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences459–457 Mya — about 2 occurrences457–455 Mya — about 9 occurrences455–454 Mya — about 9 occurrences454–452 Mya — about 11 occurrences452–450 Mya — about 28 occurrences450–449 Mya — about 27 occurrences449–447 Mya — about 20 occurrences447–445 Mya — about 19 occurrences445–444 Mya — about 9 occurrences444–442 Mya — about 3 occurrences442–440 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences440–439 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences439–437 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences437–435 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences435–434 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences434–432 Mya — about 2 occurrences432–430 Mya — about 2 occurrences430–428 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences428–427 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences427–425 Mya — about 9 occurrences425–423 Mya — about 6 occurrences423–422 Mya — about 2 occurrences457.3 Mya425 Mya472 Mya422 Mya

164 occurrences of Ascocerida on record, most of them in the Ordovician. 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

164 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

50 formations

Dunleith — 43.00°N, 91.00°WBoda Limestone — 61.17°N, 14.71°EBoda Limestone — 61.05°N, 15.20°EHemse Beds — 57.28°N, 18.32°EHemse Beds — 57.23°N, 18.37°EEllis Bay — 49.82°N, 64.35°WEllis Bay — 49.42°N, 62.25°WWhitewater — 39.00°N, 84.00°WDubuque — 45.00°N, 93.00°WDubuque — 43.00°N, 91.00°WWise Lake — 43.00°N, 91.00°WVaureal — 49.82°N, 64.35°WVaureal — 49.67°N, 62.92°WCaution Creek — 57.97°N, 94.87°WCaution Creek — 58.55°N, 95.13°WValcour — 44.87°N, 73.41°WSundre Beds — 57.53°N, 18.43°EStewartville — 45.00°N, 93.00°WStewartville — 43.50°N, 94.00°WKilley Bridge — 54.60°N, 6.87°WWaynesville — 39.45°N, 83.83°WWaynesville — 39.00°N, 84.00°WFremont — 38.00°N, 105.00°WFremont — 38.50°N, 105.17°WSlite Beds — 57.72°N, 18.80°EPortage Chute — 58.00°N, 95.00°WPortage Chute — 56.50°N, 94.25°WMaquoketa — 45.00°N, 93.00°WMaquoketa — 43.00°N, 92.00°WScales Shale — 43.00°N, 91.00°WBad Cache Rapids — 69.33°N, 81.78°WBad Cache Rapids — 68.90°N, 82.03°WBad Cache Rapids — 68.71°N, 81.94°WBønsnes — 60.08°N, 10.20°EBønsnes — 60.00°N, 10.35°EFrognerkilen — 60.00°N, 11.00°EFrognerkilen — 61.08°N, 11.75°EArnheim — 39.00°N, 84.00°WHamra Beds — 57.53°N, 18.43°E

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The named rock units Ascocerida has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 26 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 3 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Ascocerida and its relatives

Ordovician

Where Ascocerida and its relatives were recorded in the Ordovician.

Found in the same rock

1,349 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 94 sites for Ascocerida, 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

31 references

Each of the 164 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. 19 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 Ascocerida

Credit
Antonov
Licence
Public Domain
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

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 itMulticeratoidea through timeFormations of the OrdovicianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Kuhn 1949