Yilingia spiciformis

Yilingia spiciformis is a worm-like animal that lived between approximately 551 million and 539 million years ago in the Ediacaran period, around 10 million years before the Cambrian explosion. A fossil of this creature and its tracks were discovered in 2019 in Southern China. It was a segmented bilaterian, conceivably related to panarthropods or annelids. It is a rare example of a complex Ediacaran animal that is similar to animals that existed since the Cambrian, hence suggesting that perhaps the Cambrian explosion was less sudden than often assumed.

No picture of Yilingia spiciformis was found. Wikipedia, Wikidata and Smithsonian Open Access were searched and had none. iDigBio and GBIF were not searched: the Paleobiology Database does not place Yilingia spiciformis firmly enough to tell it from something else bearing the same name, and a search on the name alone returns whichever of them was photographed.

Time the record covers

At most 97 million years on record.

The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 635 Mya and 538.8 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.

Cambrian — about 0 of 1 occurrence637–634 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences634–630 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences630–627 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences627–624 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences624–620 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences620–617 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences617–614 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences614–610 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences610–607 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences607–604 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences604–600 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences600–597 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences597–594 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences594–590 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences590–587 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences587–584 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences584–580 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences580–577 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences577–574 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences574–570 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences570–567 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences567–564 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences564–560 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences560–557 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences557–554 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences554–550 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences550–547 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences547–544 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences544–540 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences540–537 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences637 Mya537 Mya

1 occurrence of Yilingia spiciformis on record. 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

1 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

Dengying — 30.79°N, 111.05°E

Loading coastlines…

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

Found in the same rock

21 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Yilingia spiciformis, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.

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 reference

Each of the 1 occurrence 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 doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content0

No picture of Yilingia spiciformis was found. Wikipedia, Wikidata and Smithsonian Open Access were searched and had none.

iDigBio and GBIF were not searched: the Paleobiology Database does not place Yilingia spiciformis firmly enough to tell it from something else bearing the same name, and a search on the name alone returns whichever of them was photographed.

No 3D scan of Yilingia spiciformis 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 it

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0.