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Description: | Specimen of a fossil asteroid (starfish), Lapworthura miltoni, collected from the Lower Leintwardine Formation of Late Silurian, Ludlow, Ludfordian age from Leintwardine, Herefordshire (Midland England). Collected by J. Goring.
The skeletons of starfish are made up of many plates of calcium carbonate. Normally, after death, these skeletons disintegrate and only fragments remain to become fossils. The Silurian rocks at Leintwardine are famous for well-preserved fossil starfish. It is thought that in late Silurian times, Leintwardine was located at the margin between the shallow and deeper part of the sea. There is evidence that submarine landslides (turbidity currents), flowing from the shallow to the deeper part of the sea, buried these starfish alive, ensuring that their complete skeletons would survive as fossils.
The specimen was found in Herefordshire.
It is from the Silurian period (443 - 418 million years ago) | Publisher: | Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums | Subjects: | Classification: Animalia Echinodermata Invertebrata J. Asteroidea Goring | Temporal: | Silurian period (443 - 418 million years ago) | Source: | Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums | Identifier: | http://www.twmuseums.org.uk/geofinder/se... | Go to resource |
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