Ophiocistioidea

Ophiocistioidea is a class of extinct echinoderms from the Palaeozoic and early Mesozoic. They most likely form a paraphyletic grade along sea cucumber stem lineage, although some sources still consider the question of ophiocistioid monophyly unresolved.

Ophiocistioidea

Charles Schuchert · 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
EchinozoaPBDB
Diet
grazerPBDB
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB
Vision
blindPBDB
Environment
marinePBDB

Time the record covers

At least 354 million years on record.

The record covers at least 426.7 Mya to 72.2 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 432.9 Mya to 66 Mya.

Silurian — about 7 of 70 occurrencesDevonian — about 28 of 70 occurrencesDevonianCarboniferous — about 19 of 70 occurrencesCarboniferousPermian — about 10 of 70 occurrencesPermianEarly Triassic — about 0 of 70 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 0 of 70 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 3 of 70 occurrencesLate TriassicEarly Jurassic — about 0 of 70 occurrencesMiddle Jurassic — about 0 of 70 occurrencesLate Jurassic — about 2 of 70 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous — about 0 of 70 occurrencesLate Cretaceous — about 1 of 70 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 70 occurrences440–428 Mya — about 2 occurrences428–415 Mya — about 7 occurrences415–402 Mya — about 4 occurrences402–389 Mya — about 12 occurrences389–377 Mya — about 10 occurrences377–364 Mya — about 1 occurrence364–351 Mya — about 9 occurrences351–338 Mya — about 4 occurrences338–326 Mya — about 3 occurrences326–313 Mya — about 2 occurrences313–300 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences300–288 Mya — about 2 occurrences275–262 Mya — about 4 occurrences262–249 Mya — about 4 occurrences249–237 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences237–224 Mya — about 2 occurrences224–211 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences211–199 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences173–160 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences160–148 Mya — about 2 occurrences84–71 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences71–59 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences426.7 Mya72.2 Mya440 Mya59 Mya

70 occurrences of Ophiocistioidea 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

70 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

22 formations

Grzegorzowice — 50.88°N, 21.03°EKowala — 50.83°N, 20.37°EKowala — 50.82°N, 20.58°EKowala — 50.80°N, 20.47°ERockford Limestone — 38.48°N, 85.75°WRockford Limestone — 40.83°N, 87.25°WHumevale — 37.47°S, 145.23°EHumevale — 37.75°S, 145.35°EAllan Mountain limestone — 45.68°N, 111.03°WNötsch — 46.62°N, 13.60°ELodgepole limestone — 45.68°N, 111.03°WJulfa — 38.94°N, 45.58°EBell Canyon — 31.88°N, 104.80°WCassian — 46.59°N, 12.26°EChouteau limestone — 38.85°N, 92.45°WCompton limestone — 37.70°N, 93.80°WWhite Chalk — 54.52°N, 13.63°ESevery Shale — 40.03°N, 96.03°WLochkov — 49.98°N, 14.18°EZechstein — 50.65°N, 11.53°EBeattie — 39.56°N, 96.02°WFlorena — 38.62°N, 96.36°WLower Leintwardine — 52.37°N, 2.88°WMuch Wenlock Limestone — 52.08°N, 2.35°WSedgley Limestone — 52.53°N, 2.13°WBuechel — 51.00°N, 7.15°E

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The named rock units Ophiocistioidea has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 23 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Ophiocistioidea and its relatives

Devonian

Where Ophiocistioidea and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.

Found in the same rock

662 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 44 sites for Ophiocistioidea, 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

28 references

Each of the 70 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. 16 further references are not listed. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Ophiocistioidea

Credit
Charles Schuchert
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 itEchinozoa through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Sollas 1899)