Kunmingella

Kunmingella is genus of Cambrian bradoriid from the Chengjiang biota, containing the single species Kunmingella douvillei. Kunmingella had 12 appendages, including a pair of antennae as well pairs of biramous limbs, including four anterior pairs of appendages bearing double rows of endites on their endopods, and a posterior 5 with only a single row of endites, as well as two terminal pairs of uniramous limbs. Eggs have been found preserved attached to the posteriormost three pairs of biramous limbs, suggesting it engaged in brood care. Around 50–80 eggs, each around 150–180 μm across were attached in total.

Kunmingella

瑞丽江的河水 · CC BY-SA 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
KunmingellidaePBDB
Diet
omnivorePBDB
Life habit
nektobenthicPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB
Vision
blindPBDB, for Bradoriida

Time the record covers

At most 6.5 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 521 Mya and 514.5 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Cambrian — about 53 of 53 occurrencesCambrian521–521 Mya — about 2 occurrences521–521 Mya — about 2 occurrences521–520 Mya — about 2 occurrences520–520 Mya — about 2 occurrences520–520 Mya — about 2 occurrences520–520 Mya — about 2 occurrences520–519 Mya — about 2 occurrences519–519 Mya — about 2 occurrences519–519 Mya — about 2 occurrences519–519 Mya — about 2 occurrences519–518 Mya — about 2 occurrences518–518 Mya — about 2 occurrences518–518 Mya — about 2 occurrences518–518 Mya — about 2 occurrences518–517 Mya — about 2 occurrences517–517 Mya — about 2 occurrences517–517 Mya — about 2 occurrences517–517 Mya — about 2 occurrences517–516 Mya — about 2 occurrences516–516 Mya — about 2 occurrences516–516 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences516–516 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences516–515 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences515–515 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences515–515 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences515–515 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences521.5 Mya514 Mya

53 occurrences of Kunmingella 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

53 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

4 formations

Yuanshan — 24.81°N, 102.58°EYuanshan — 24.67°N, 102.65°EYuanshan — 24.84°N, 102.41°EYuanshan — 25.72°N, 103.99°EYuanshan — 25.50°N, 102.40°EYuanshan — 25.68°N, 102.17°EYuanshan — 25.40°N, 103.38°EYuanshan — 24.00°N, 102.00°EYu'anshan — 25.33°N, 103.50°EYu'anshan — 25.55°N, 102.40°EYu'anshan — 24.77°N, 102.58°EShuijingtuo — 32.53°N, 107.92°EShuijingtuo — 34.32°N, 108.70°EDengying — 33.67°N, 109.46°E

Loading coastlines…

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

Kunmingella and its relatives

Cambrian

Where Kunmingella and its relatives were recorded in the Cambrian.

Found in the same rock

286 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 42 sites for Kunmingella, 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

10 references

Each of the 53 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. 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 Kunmingella

Credit
瑞丽江的河水
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
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

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 itKunmingellidae through timeFormations of the CambrianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Huo 1956