scholarly journals An examination of the Devonian fishes of Michigan

PeerJ ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
pp. e5636
Author(s):  
Jack Stack ◽  
Lauren Sallan
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Middle Devonian ◽  
Fish Fauna ◽  
Open Water ◽  
Field Work ◽  
Fish Diversity ◽  
Late Devonian ◽  
Accessible Region ◽  
Recent Collection ◽  
Reef Fauna

We surveyed the taxa, ecosystems, and localities of the Devonian fishes of Michigan to provide a framework for renewed study, to learn about the diversity and number of these fishes, and to investigate their connection to other North American faunas. Nineteen genera of fishes have been found in the Middle and Late Devonian deposits of Michigan, of which thirteen are ‘placoderms’ represented by material ranging from articulated head shields to ichthyoliths. As expected from the marine nature of these deposits, ‘placoderms’ are overwhelmingly arthrodire in nature, but two genera of ptyctodonts have been reported along with less common petalichthyid material. The remaining fish fauna consists of fin-spines attributed to ‘acanthodians’, two genera of potential crown chondrichthyans, an isolated dipnoan, and onychodont teeth/jaw material. There was an apparent drop in fish diversity and fossil abundance between Middle and Late Devonian sediments. This pattern may be attributed to a paucity of Late Devonian sites, along with a relative lack of recent collection efforts at existing outcrops. It may also be due to a shift towards open water pelagic environments at Late Devonian localities, as opposed to the nearshore reef fauna preserved in the more numerous Middle Devonian localities. The Middle Devonian vertebrate fauna in Michigan shows strong connections with same-age assemblages from Ohio and New York. Finally, we document the presence of partially articulated vertebrate remains associated with benthic invertebrates, an uncommon occurrence in Devonian strata outside of North America. We anticipate this new survey will guide future field work efforts in an undersampled yet highly accessible region that preserves an abundance of fishes from a critical interval in marine vertebrate evolution.

Fishes of the Old Red Sandstone and Systemic Boundaries Blossburg, Pennsylvania 1830-1900

1992 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 21-29 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Leviton ◽  
Michele Aldrich
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Fish Fauna ◽  
Field Work ◽  
Upper Devonian ◽  
Boundary Problems ◽  
Lower Carboniferous ◽  
Red Sandstone ◽  
Survey Report ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
Floodplain Sediments

During the Late Devonian, in what is now northcentral Pennsylvania, slow moving streams meandered across the plain of the "Catskill" Delta. A varied fish fauna lived in these streams, and their remains are entombed in the ancient stream channel and floodplain sediments. In the 1830's, English railroad engineer Richard Cowling Taylor visited the coal mining community of Blossburg and remarked on the analogy between the Old Red Sandstone of England and that found near Blossburg. Not long afterwards, James Hall (1811-1898), best known for his work on Paleozoic invertebrates of New York, also visited Blossburg to clear up vexing boundary problems in the New York formations. He obtained fish scales from the red sandstones, many of which he identified as scales of Holoptychus nobilissimus, a crossopterygian fish described by Louis Agassiz in 1839. In his annual report for 1839 to the New York Legislature, Hall also took note of some large scales, which were unlike any previously described. Under pressure from the Governor, Hall, like the other survey scientists, had to submit timely reports even if studies were incomplete, and he hurriedly described the new scales, referring them to a new genus and species, Sauritolepis taylori. In his final survey report (1843). Hall dealt more fully with the new fish, renaming it Sauripteris taylori based on the fin structure, the significance of which he had not earlier recognized. The Blossburg fishes did not languish in obscurity; James DeKay referred to them in his checklist of fishes of New York, as did Charles Lyell in his 1845 Travels in North America. In 1890 John Strong Newberry placed the fish fossils in the Lower Carboniferous; he also described several new species. Hall's handling of the fossil fish he had before him and, indeed, the reasons for entering Pennsylvania in the first place, are emblematic of the way much science was practiced in the first half of the 19th century. Further, recent field work in the Blossburg area shows Hall's astuteness as a field geologist for he correctly placed the fish in the Upper Devonian, although in this region the Upper Devonian-Lower Carboniferous boundary is not well defined.

Phyllolepid placoderm fish remains from the Devonian Aztec Siltstone, southern Victoria Land, Antarctica

2005 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 387-408 ◽  
Author(s):  
GAVIN C. YOUNG ◽  
JOHN A. LONG
Keyword(s):  
Mass Extinction ◽  
Middle Devonian ◽  
Fish Fauna ◽  
Disjunct Distribution ◽  
Late Devonian ◽  
Antarctic Species ◽  
Victoria Land ◽  
Fish Remains ◽  
Dispersal Events ◽  
The Antarctic

Phyllolepid placoderm remains from the Aztec Siltstone fish fauna are described as Austrophyllolepis quiltyi sp. nov., Austrophyllolepis cf. A. youngi, Placolepis tingeyi sp. nov., and phyllolepid indet. The new Antarctic species of two genera previously only known from Australia reinforce evidence from other fish taxa of close biogeographic affinity, as part of the eastern margin of Palaeozoic Gondwana. At least three genera and four species gives the Aztec Siltstone fish fauna the most diverse phyllolepid assemblage known, and probably the oldest documented so far (?late Middle Devonian). Specimens of Austrophyllolepis from the type locality at Mount Howitt, Victoria, are refigured for comparison with the Antarctic species. The order Phyllolepida is a key group for understanding Devonian vertebrate biogeography and palaeogeography, with a unique disjunct distribution in both time and space between the Southern and Northern hemispheres. Phyllolepids document one of the major dispersal events in early vertebrate history, which approximately coincided with the Frasnian–Famennian boundary mass extinction during the Late Devonian.

Delthyris sculptilis Hall, 1843 (Brachiopoda) from the Middle Devonian Hamilton Group is a Megakozlowskiella

1986 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 965-967
Author(s):  
William F. Koch
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
North America ◽  
Middle Devonian ◽  
Eastern North America ◽  
Upper Limit ◽  
Hamilton Group

Delthyris sculptilis Hall, 1843, from the Middle Devonian Hamilton Group of New York and equivalent rocks elsewhere in eastern North America, has long been assigned to the genus Delthyris or, in certain older studies, to the genus Spirifer. Recent restudy of this brachiopod shows that it belongs to the genus Megakozlowskiella Boucot, 1962. This extends the upper limit of Megakozlowskiella from the Eifelian (Southwood Stage, Onondaga Limestone in New York) to the Givetian (Tioughnioga Stage, Moscow Formation of the Hamilton Group in New York).

Successful complete digestion of well lithified shale and extraction of microfossils from Devonian beds in western New York

Stratigraphy ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 205-212
Author(s):  
Kimberly C. Meehan ◽  
Cody Kowalski ◽  
Kimberly Bartlett ◽  
Isabelle Li ◽  
Paul Bembia
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Quaternary Ammonium ◽  
Sedimentary Rock ◽  
Complete Analysis ◽  
Late Devonian ◽  
Thin Sections ◽  
Devonian Shale ◽  
Complete Digestion ◽  
Quaternary Ammonium Surfactants ◽  
Traditional Approaches

ABSTRACT: Researchers in paleontological and paleoecological sciences often need complete disaggregation of rock materials for certain lines of investigation. However, complete disaggregation of more lithified sedimentary rock is known to be problematic. A complete shale disaggregation method implementing quaternary ammonium surfactants,widely used in paleontological sciences for poorly lithified shale and mudstone, was successfully used on well lithified Devonian shale in the Appalachian Basin ofWestern New York. Over 50 Devonian gray and black shale samples were collected from multiple localities in western New York (Cashaqua, Rhinestreet, Skaneateles, Windom, and Ludlowville), coarsely crushed, and fully immersed in a quaternary ammonium surfactant until complete disaggregation was achieved (5–14 days); aliquots were run through a series of nested sieves. The sieved sediments contained hundreds of well-preserved microfossils released from the shale: ostracods, dacryoconarids, and previously unreported palymorphs, charophytes, agglutinated foraminifera, miospores, and other microspherules. These microfossils were easily found within disaggregated and sieved samples but were unrecognizable on the shale surface and destroyed in prior investigations of whole rock thin sections. In addition to more traditional approaches, inclusion of this complete rock disaggregation method may assist in a more complete analysis of material, increase our understandings of ancient basin systems and have important implications on our understanding of the paleoecology during the Late Devonian marine biotic crises.

scholarly journals Present and past status of fish fauna of river Basantar, an important tributary of the river Ravi, in Samba district, Jammu (J&K)

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 123-126 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arti Sharma ◽  
S. P. S. Dutta
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Factors ◽  
Fish Species ◽  
Fish Fauna ◽  
Fish Diversity ◽  
Anthropogenic Pressure

Icthyofaunal study of river Basantar, an important tributary of river Ravi in Samba district, Jammu (J&K) has revealed the existence of 35 fish species belonging to 5 orders, 10 families and 25 genera. There is dominance of Cypriniformes (18 spp.) followed by Siluriformes (10 spp.), Perciformes (4 spp.), Synbrachiformes (2 spp.) and Osteoglossiformes (1 sps.). Present record of 35 fish species when compared with the earlier report of 59 fish species reveals a decline in fish diversity and is caused by environmental factors and anthropogenic pressure.

scholarly journals Fish Diversity in Huchharayanakere, Shikaripura, Shivamogga District, Karnataka, India

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 11-22
Author(s):  
H M Ashashree ◽  
H A Sayeswara ◽  
K L Naik ◽  
N Kumara Swamy ◽  
Nafeesa Begum
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Fish Fauna ◽  
Single Species ◽  
Economic Importance ◽  
Fish Diversity ◽  
Fish Health ◽  
Chemical Condition ◽  
Physico Chemical ◽  
The Family ◽  
Faunal Diversity

Fresh water wetlands are fragile ecosystems, which are fast deterioring and shrinking due to manmade activities. The fish composition of Huchharayanakere of Shikaripura was studied for a period of twelve months from January to December 2015. The icthyo-faunal diversity of this pond confirmed the occurrence of 13 species of fishes belonging to 5 families. The family Cyprinidae represented by 9 species. Families Anabantidae, Bagridae, Clupeidae and Notopteridae were represented by only a single species. Simultaneously the physico-chemical condition of the water body revealed that water quality is suitable for fish culture. The study of fish fauna of an aquatic body is useful for planning of fisheries development. The pond needs proper management and utilization of this fish wealth and sustainable steps to monitor and conserve the fish health. The present study revealed that Huchharayanakere of Shikaripura harbors wide varieties of fish with economic importance in local and global trade. The study will provide future strategies for development and fish conservation.

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