Oppelia

Oppelia is a haploceratoid ammonite and type genus for the Oppeliidae that lived during the Middle Jurassic. Shells of Oppelia are involute with a small to moderate size umbilicus, bluntly rounded to sharp venter, and deeply impressed dorsum. Sides are generally smooth but may be variously ribbed on the outer flanks. Similar and related genera include Oxycerites and Oecotraustes.

Oppelia

Ghedoghedo · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
OppeliidaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Ammonoidea
Life habit
nektonicPBDB, for Ammonoidea
Motility
fast-movingPBDB, for Ammonoidea
Vision
well-developedPBDB, for Cephalopoda
Environment
marinePBDB, for Cephalopoda

Time the record covers

At least 46 million years on record.

The record covers at least 168.2 Mya to 121.4 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 170.9 Mya to 113.2 Mya.

Middle Jurassic — about 35 of 55 occurrencesMiddle JurassicLate Jurassic — about 6 of 55 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 14 of 55 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous172–170 Mya — about 7 occurrences170–168 Mya — about 15 occurrences166–164 Mya — about 4 occurrences164–162 Mya — about 7 occurrences162–160 Mya — about 2 occurrences158–156 Mya — about 2 occurrences156–154 Mya — about 2 occurrences154–152 Mya — about 1 occurrence144–142 Mya — about 2 occurrences142–140 Mya — about 4 occurrences140–138 Mya — about 4 occurrences138–136 Mya — about 2 occurrences136–134 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences134–132 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences122–120 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences120–118 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences118–116 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences116–114 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences114–112 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences168.2 Mya121.4 Mya172 Mya112 Mya

55 occurrences of Oppelia on record, most of them in the Middle Jurassic. 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

55 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

10 formations

Steinmühl — 47.91°N, 14.35°ETsudakhar — 42.65°N, 46.93°ETsudakhar — 42.33°N, 47.60°EChaloi — 39.80°N, 54.38°EChaloi — 39.75°N, 54.50°EKumukh — 42.17°N, 47.12°EKumukh — 42.65°N, 46.93°ETaberna — 16.78°N, 96.95°WKatrol — 23.50°N, 70.50°E"Sengenthal" — 49.23°N, 11.47°EHelvetiafjellet — 78.10°N, 13.89°ERurikfjellet — 78.10°N, 13.95°EAbundancia — 27.34°S, 70.23°W

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The named rock units Oppelia has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 21 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Oppelia and its relatives

Middle Jurassic

Where Oppelia and its relatives were recorded in the Middle Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

256 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 42 sites for Oppelia, 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

18 references

Each of the 55 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. 6 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 content2

Picture of Oppelia

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
Steinkern
Licence
CC Attribution-NonCommercial
Commercial use
the licence does not allow it

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itOppeliidae through timeFormations of the Middle JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0.