Messel Shales

I love the Messel Shales. Have I not mentioned this before?

How silly of me... anyway, yeah. The Messel Shales are one of those incredible palaeontology discoveries that crop up a lot in recent fossil finds. Messel is of particular interest to moi as it is well known for its well preserved bat fossils.

The Messel Shales are located in Germany, and palaeontologists believe it was once a deep lake with a lack of oxygen at the bottom. This meant it did not contain the normal bacteria for decomposition as other lakes, resulting in beautifully preserved fossils. Examples include an ancestor of the woodpecker with detailed tail feathers and insects still retaining their original colour pigments. There have been many discoveries of bat fossils here, most with their wings folded back as if they were diving or falling out of mid-air.

This is my own replica fossil bat, Palaeochiropteryx tupaiodon. The original is shown above.

I did some calculations of wing morphology for my replica as part of my EPQ, and my findings showed it to have wings typical of insectivorous bats. This suggests it was a slow flyer which hunted close to the forest floor, with slow flight but high manoeuvrability in midair. This low flight speed may have made it particularly vulnerable to the poisonous gases from the lake (explained below).

Analysis of the geology of the lake has helped to understand why the fossil bats looked this way. It has been suggested that if carbon dioxide accumulated in the oxygen deficient water at the bottom and was then mixed with the normal water above, a large volume of poisonous gas would suddenly be released. This occurred at Lake Nyos in Cameroon, 1986, when carbon dioxide was released from the lake and killed over 1700 people. The similarities in the geology of the two lakes have lead scientists to believe Messel was similar, especially the presence of siderite at both (which is thought to indicate the presence of carbon-dioxide in lakes). Also, 50 million years ago the Messel Shales were situated on top of an active fault line, which suggests a cause for the mixing of the two types of water.

More fossils!




Jewelled wing beetle. The preservation of coloured pigments in fossils is really really rare.


Ida! (I hope you've all heard of this one, it got a lot of media attention). This is presumed to be representative of one of the missing links in the early evolution of primates.


Frogs.



Leptictidium, as featured on BBCs Walking With Beasts (I may talk about this more in a later post... essentially, this programme was one of the things that got me interested in palaeontology when I was little. Also, Mesozoic fauna gets too much attention! Cenozoic animals are interesting too!)

The BBC programme featured the Messel fauna in its first episode, focusing on the Eocene. This period of the Earth's history occurred after the extinction of the dinosaurs, and is the time when the major mammal groups diversified. At this time, the apex predators were things like Gastornis, below:



...and also Ambulocetus:



Believe it or not, this is one of the early ancestors of cetaceans like whales and dolphins. Mesonychids (hoofed predators) such as Andrewsarchus (the largest land predator to exist... I may blog about it later, its awesome) are also theorised to be related to them...

Messel also had giant ants, 5.5cm long.


 Its funny that pretty much everything in this post could be the subject of its own separate, much longer blog post!

... why am I posting this? I really have no idea. Hope you found it vaguely interesting.

Even if the morrow is barren of promises, nothing shall forestall my return...

Becky x

Octopods

The next part of my jewellery update. This started off as an experiment with the oval shaped beads, but I really like how they came out!

 



The beads are glass and the eyes are made from hematite. These little guys are super cute and every one is unique as the tentacles are always different!

I couldnt decide between pendants and earrings, so I'm going with both. Earrings are £12.50, and pendants are £6.99. If you dont want one in red or blue, let me know, and I'll see if I can get hold of the beads in different colours for you!

So, in honour of my new octopus-themed jewellery, this blog post is all about cephalopods!

A group of octopus is called a consortium. The correct version of the plural is either octopuses or octopodes, with octopi being incorrect as the word does not have a latin origin.

Octopuses have three hearts; two of which pump blood through the gills and another which pumps blood to the rest of the body.

In our blood cells we have haemoglobin as the oxygen carrying molecule, which is stored in our red blood cells. Octopuses, however, use haemocyanin dissolved in the blood plasma (the liquidy stuff which blood cells are found in), and this makes the blood appear blue.

Octopuses are very intelligent creatures, and are the only invertebrates which have been observed to use tools.

This one can use a rubiks cube, which instantly makes it more intelligent than me. I cant solve them at all :(

 

Although several species of octopus are venomous, the only one which is deadly to humans is the blue ringed octopus:

 

 

Octopuses are poorly represented in the fossil record as their bodies are almost entirely made up of soft tissues which decompose very quickly after death. The precise conditions needed for a fossil to form are rare - no scavengers, anoxic conditions (lack of oxygen which would prevent bacterial action) and rapid sedimentation rate (the body is buried quickly). However, fossils have been found.

 

 

This specimen is around 95 million years old, and shows very little difference to modern octopuses. Due to the extreme rarity of fossils, the evolutionary history of these animals is unknown.

 

I hope you like the new jewellery!

 

Even if the morrow is barren of promises, nothing shall forestall my return...

 

Becky x





Update

Boring title is boring. Lots of interesting things in this post! (hopefully)

I've been on holiday, hence the lack of updates. I went to Austria and then the Olympics.

Awesome Ice Age carvings.

Omnomnom its called a Coupe Danemark (vanilla ice cream, hot chocolate sauce and cream)

Obligatory photo of some mountains.

A German athlete who let people pose for photos with his gold medal!

Me in the stadium.

Usain Bolt getting ready for his 200m victory.

Also, today was results day! I was extremely shocked to get a fantastic set of results, and I'm so excited that I will be going to Queens' College Cambridge to study Natural Sciences! Cannot wait!!!

Now off to have a little mini pizza takeaway party with the family to celebrate! Wooh!

Did you get results today? How did they go?

I hope you all did fantastic and got into the uni you wanted to!

Even if the morrow is barren of promises, nothing shall forestall my return...

Becky xx

Megalodon... also, name change!

Yeah, things got a bit confusing and I decided to rename the blog. Well, technically its not renaming it, its just reshuffling the url of my old blog 'Halcyon Days Jewellery' and this one. 'Compendium of dreams' was really a rushed, last minute name choice and I couldnt think of anything else at the time. When I found out you could, in fact, change it, I decided it would be good in the long run if I did so.

Sorry for any confusion! This makes it a lot easier for business cards/in-progress-etsy-account if the name of my 'website' matches the name of my business!

To confirm, the old blog (which was really just an extension of my dA account) is now called Compendium of Dreams and this blog is now Halcyon Days. Again, I'm sorry...

On to the main reason for this post...

As you are no doubt aware, I went swimming with sharks recently as a birthday present. So this blog is about one of my favourite prehistoric creatures: Megalodon, the biggest shark to have ever lived.

Perhaps the most interesting (and scary) fact about Megalodon is its sheer size. To put it in perspective, this is a Megalodon tooth and two Great White Shark teeth(the largest predatory fish currently alive):

An early jaw reconstruction:

Aaaaaaannd heres the scale vs a Great White and a human:

This was one BIG fish. Not the biggest fish ever (Leedsichthys, I think, is the current title holder), but definitely the biggest predatory fish. This shark was so large it ate whales, which we can figure out from serration marks on the teeth and in fossilised whale bones.

Don't worry, it is EXTINCT. No one really knows why it went extinct, but current theories suggest the changing water temperature is to blame. Like many other creatures like it (Loch Ness Monster plesiosaur anyone?), there are cryptozoological theories that these sharks have survived in deep sea trenches. It is true that we have not explored all of the ocean depths, but all the Megalodon teeth that are found are ancient, not recently shed as they would be if it was still alive (and sharks shed a lot of teeth). Despite the claims, no proof has yet been found.

And I really should point out, there are no sharks alive today anywhere near its size, and Jaws is all unrealistic scaremongering. You dont get Great Whites that size, and as I've just said, Megalodon is extinct. Sharks are beautiful creatures and deserve our respect. Even Great Whites, which admittedly are very scary creatures, command such power and agility in their hunting style that we should certainly admire them for it. All ecosystems need an apex predator, after all, and lightning strikes kill more people than sharks do. All that rubbish about them being bloodthirsty killers is not true at all.

Like all sharks, Megalodon was cartilaginous, which means instead of bones it had cartilage (the same stuff in your ear lobes). This also means that the only bits to be found fossilised are the teeth, and theres a lot of them about. A sort of average size is 7 inches, although they have been found bigger. Sharks go through several sets of teeth during their life, and are constantly growing new ones in rows to replace those lost.

Whilst in Edinburgh I decided to treat myself to a tooth, because its something I've always wanted.

My tooth is polished, which gives it a lovely, beautiful shine. It's almost complete, with only a small bit of the root missing, and the edge is still sharp and serrated. Its not especially large, as Megalodon teeth go (still as big as my hand!), but the larger ones were verging on £200 which was too expensive for me.

But I like the one I've got! It looks nice in the cabinet next to my Yellow River fishie, ostrich egg and trilobite. I'm building up a nice little collection here!

What do you guys collect? Anything special/expensive?

Oh and expect a jewellery update pretty soon :D

Even if the morrow is barren of promises, nothing shall forestall my return...

Becky xx

Birthday plans! And horseshoe crabs :3

I know my birthday isnt till July, but plans are already well underway... I mean, come on, you only turn 18 once, right?

I am super excited about this.

I'm going to swim with sharks!!!!! How awesome is that?? Its at Edinburgh Aquarium, and we're also going to go see the pandas at the zoo while we're up there (and go shopping, of course =P).

Haha I didnt realise just how big these sharks were... They have one thats 12ft long (ironically named Tinkerbell). 12 ft. That is one damn big shark. 

Trying to find the link on youtube to the best video which shows just how big it is... Finding lots of encouraging videos called things like 'When Shark Dives Go Wrong!!', which is nice. Several friends have already said they're convinced I'm going to be eaten and want me to promise to ring them on the train home to tell them I'll alive =D

So excited about this!!! Actually cannot wait!!! (Although I'll be honest, I am slightly scared...)

Anyways...

I figured it was about time I posted a blog about these little critters. Horseshoe crabs.

I saw them for the first time in one of those documentary programmes, and my reaction was 'That's CGI. Creatures like that dont actually exist!!' They looked so prehistoric, like they belonged in Walking With Dinosaurs or something, I was amazed to find that they do exist.

And they are damn awesome. I mean, look at them.

They're so cute (in a weird kind of way), little shuffly things that look like trilobites but arent trilobites. I saw some specimens in uni museums which made me even more interested, they're such fascinating, unique animals. Like bats, I suppose.

(And speaking of unis, I finalised my choices on UCAS the other day, EEEEK D= )

Horseshoe crabs are a great source of interest to scientists because of their blood, which doesnt contain haemoglobin like humans (red) but haemocyanin (blue). They are harvested for their blood, which I think is rather cruel, especially given the mortality rates, but this has lots of potential medical benefits for humans.

They're one of these amazing animals (like sharks) which have been around for millions and millions of years unchanged by evolution.



Now this doesnt really make a lot of sense to me (as an amateur palaeontologist about to enter uni). Reading about dramatic extinction events like the End-Permian (which wiped out 95% of all species) or the more well known KT event (think meteorites and dinosaurs), it seems so unlikely that a creature could survive something like that - not only once, but several times! These animals (and sharks and other living fossils like turtles too), have survived many of these events, and remained virtually unchanged on the other side!

Perhaps living in the sea gives an advantage, as the environment tends to remain more constant than on land. But then again, certainly for the End Permian, the evidence suggests anoxic conditions which would have caused difficulties for aquatic life as well as terrestrial.

And that is why I want to be a paleontologist, my friends. So many mysteries out there, so much more that is not understood!

Sorry for boring you all with my palaeo rants =D Hope you're having a lovely Easter, wherever you are!

Much love, Becky xx

PS: you can now sponsor me online for my 27 mile charity walk!! (see other blog post) Please help us raise lots of money to help the 27 million worldwide who are victimes of slavery!! Thank you!  http://www.justgiving.com/Rebecca-Bennion

Velociraptor et al

A fossil of Velociraptor has been found with contents of its last meal in its stomach, a bone from a large pterosaur.

This has sparked a lot of debate among palaeontologists, as it was thought that Velociraptor was a hunter rather than a scavenger (the pterosaur being too large for it to hunt itself).

According to Dr David Hone, University College Dublin:

"Gut contents are pretty rare and pterosaur bones are rather fragile and don't preserve well, so it is an unusual find."

This got me thinking about other unusual finds in fossils, mostly ichthyosaurs... like this fossilised embryo in Bristol museum:

Although fossil embryos such as these are generally rare, in ichthyosaurs they are relatively common. This has enabled palaeontologists to determine that the creature was viviparous - it gave birth to live young.

Here is another pic of an ichthyosaur, this time with the contents of its last meal preserved:

This is a Whitby ichthyosaur, and although you cant see it well from the picture it has several nicely preserved belemnites and pyritised ammonites in amongst the stomach contents.

All the pictures here were taken by moi, mostly as part of my university travels - if you're stuck for time before a train home, checking out the museum is a good idea =D It also helps when trying to figure out which zoo/palaeo departments have the best research projects, as you can compare the quality and range of the specimens on display.