Ceractinomorpha

Demosponges or common sponges are sponges of the class Demospongiae, the most diverse group in the phylum Porifera which include greater than 90% of all extant sponges with nearly 8,800 species worldwide. Being siliceous sponges, they are predominantly leuconoid in structure with an endoskeleton made of a meshwork of spicules consisting of fibers of the protein spongin, the mineral silica, or both. Where spicules of silica are present, they have a different shape from those in the otherwise similar glass sponges. Some species, in particular from the Antarctic, obtain the silica for spicule-building from the ingestion of diatoms.

Ceractinomorpha

Twilight Zone Expedition Team 2007, NOAA-OE · 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
DemospongiaePBDB
Diet
suspension feederPBDB
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB
Motility
stationary, attachedPBDB
Vision
blindPBDB, for Porifera

Time the record covers

At least 270 million years on record.

The record covers at least 470.3 Mya to 199.5 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 475.3 Mya to 192.9 Mya.

Ordovician — about 37 of 43 occurrencesOrdovicianSilurian — about 0 of 43 occurrencesDevonian — about 1 of 43 occurrencesDevonianCarboniferous — about 0 of 43 occurrencesPermian — about 2 of 43 occurrencesPermianEarly Triassic — about 0 of 43 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 0 of 43 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 2 of 43 occurrencesLate TriassicEarly Jurassic — about 1 of 43 occurrences481–471 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences471–461 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences461–452 Mya — about 21 occurrences452–442 Mya — about 15 occurrences412–403 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences403–393 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences285–275 Mya — about 2 occurrences275–266 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences236–226 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences226–217 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences217–207 Mya — about 1 occurrence207–197 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences197–187 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences470.3 Mya199.5 Mya481 Mya187 Mya

43 occurrences of Ceractinomorpha on record, most of them in the Ordovician. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. 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

43 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

16 formations

Wardell — 37.08°N, 81.55°WWardell — 37.10°N, 81.34°WWardell — 37.00°N, 81.00°WWardell — 37.02°N, 81.73°WWardell — 37.03°N, 81.79°WWardell — 37.06°N, 81.75°WCliffield — 37.06°N, 81.76°WCliffield — 37.17°N, 81.48°WCliffield — 37.10°N, 81.56°WCliffield — 37.00°N, 81.00°WCliffield — 37.02°N, 81.63°WCliffield — 37.10°N, 81.66°WBenbolt — 37.10°N, 81.34°WBenbolt — 37.22°N, 81.36°WBenbolt — 37.23°N, 81.10°WBenbolt — 37.00°N, 81.00°WBenbolt — 37.23°N, 81.32°WBenbolt — 37.08°N, 81.71°WWitten Limestone — 37.20°N, 81.36°WWitten Limestone — 37.11°N, 81.52°WWitten Limestone — 37.02°N, 81.63°WWhitewater — 39.42°N, 85.01°WWhitewater — 39.00°N, 84.00°WArnheim — 35.50°N, 86.50°WHess — 30.41°N, 103.12°WFairview — 39.00°N, 84.00°WWaynesville — 39.00°N, 84.00°WCarters Limestone — 35.50°N, 86.50°WHermitage — 35.50°N, 86.50°WLeipers — 35.50°N, 86.50°WCalcari Grigi — 46.10°N, 11.90°ELimestone Mountain — 63.27°N, 154.55°WGarden City — 42.00°N, 111.58°WSaluda — 39.07°N, 85.25°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Ceractinomorpha has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Ceractinomorpha and its relatives

Ordovician

Where Ceractinomorpha and its relatives were recorded in the Ordovician.

Found in the same rock

481 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 38 sites for Ceractinomorpha, 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

13 references

Each of the 43 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. 1 further reference is 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 Ceractinomorpha

Credit
Twilight Zone Expedition Team 2007, NOAA-OE
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 itDemospongiae through timeFormations of the OrdovicianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Levi 1953