Lanarkopterus
Lanarkopterus is a genus of prehistoric eurypterid with one recognised species, Lanarkopterus dolichoschelus. Lanarkopterus was long seen as a species of the related Mixopterus, though more complete specimens discovered in the 1960s determined that it differed in several aspects, enough to warrant a separate genus.

Super Dromaeosaurus · 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
- LanarkopteridaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Eurypterida
- Life habit
- nektobenthicPBDB, for Eurypterida
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Eurypterida
- Vision
- well-developedPBDB, for Eurypterida
Time the record covers
At most 11 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 432.9 Mya and 422.7 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
2 occurrences of Lanarkopterus on record, most of them in the Silurian. 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
2 occurrences- Silurian100%
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
- Slot Burn Formation · Waterhead Group1
- Fish Bed Formation1
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The named rock units Lanarkopterus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.
Lanarkopterus and its relatives
SilurianWhere Lanarkopterus and its relatives were recorded in the Silurian.
Found in the same rock
25 taxa- Hughmilleria2 sites
- Parastylonurus ornatus2 sites
- Plantae2 sites
- ? Bracyhopterella sp.1 site
- Ateleaspis1 site
- Ateleaspis tessellata1 site
- Birkenia1 site
- Birkenia elegans1 site
- Brachyopterella1 site
- Ciderius cooperi1 site
- Lanarkia1 site
- Lanarkia horrida1 site
- Lanarkia lanceolata1 site
- Lanarkia spinosa1 site
- Lanarkia spinulosa1 site
- Lasanius1 site
- Lasanius armatus1 site
- Lasanius ornatus1 site
- Lasanius problematicus1 site
- Loganellia1 site
- Logania scotica1 site
- Phyllocarida1 site
- Pseudarthron whittingtoni1 site
- Shielia taiti1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 2 sites for Lanarkopterus, 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
1 referenceEach of the 2 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 the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Lanarkopterus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Super Dromaeosaurus
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Lanarkopterus 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 itLanarkopteridae through timeFormations of the SilurianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0.