Orbitolina

Searched as Orbitolina conica. The Paleobiology Database treats Orbitolina as the accepted name.

Orbitolina is an extinct genus of foraminifera belonging to the order Textulariida and family Orbitolinidae. Fossils of this genus are widely found in beds deposited in the Tethys Ocean ranging from Aptian to Cenomanian in age. It has been used as a shallow carbonate platform facies marker and as a Cretaceous index fossil.

Orbitolina

Larry D. Moore · CC BY 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
OrbitolininaePBDB
Diet
detritivorePBDB, for Textulariina
Life habit
infaunalPBDB, for Textulariina
Motility
stationaryPBDB, for Foraminifera

Time the record covers

At most 78 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 143.1 Mya and 66 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Late Jurassic — about 0 of 16 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous — about 1 of 16 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 15 of 16 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 16 occurrences145–142 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences142–139 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences139–137 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences137–134 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences134–131 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences131–129 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences129–126 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences126–123 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences123–121 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences121–118 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences118–115 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences115–113 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences113–110 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences110–107 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences107–105 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences105–102 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences102–99 Mya — about 3 occurrences99–97 Mya — about 6 occurrences97–94 Mya — about 6 occurrences94–91 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences91–89 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences89–86 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences86–83 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences83–80 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences80–78 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences78–75 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences75–72 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences72–70 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences70–67 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences67–64 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences145 Mya64 Mya

16 occurrences of Orbitolina on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. 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

16 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

1 formation

Halal — 30.37°N, 33.52°EHalal — 30.72°N, 33.48°EHalal — 30.80°N, 33.45°E

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The named rock units Orbitolina has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 12 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Orbitolina and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Orbitolina and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

479 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 64 sites for Orbitolina, 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 16 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 Orbitolina

Credit
Larry D. Moore
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Orbitolina was found in Smithsonian Open Access and Sketchfab.

MorphoSource 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 itOrbitolininae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. D'Orbigny 1850