Worthenia

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Worthenia
Temporal range: Devonian - Triassic
Worthenia.jpg
Worthenia cf. tabulata
Scientific classification
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Kues & Batten, 2001 [2]
Genus:
Worthenia

de Koninck, 1883 [3]

Worthenia is a genus of fossil sea snails, an extinct marine gastropod genus found in the fossil record. This genus is primarily found in rocks formed during the Devonian to Triassic periods (416 million to 200 million years ago) from the central areas of North America. Worthenia was named for the paleontologist Amos Henry Worthen who lived 1813 - 1888. [4]

Worthenia species have a "turban-shaped shell in which a raised ridge follows the margin of the whorls. Small nodes occur along the ridge, and the opening of the shell is oval and large." [5]

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<i>Lirabuccinum dirum</i> Species of mollusc

Lirabuccinum dirum, commonly known as the dire whelk, the spindle shell or the spindle whelk, is a species of sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Buccinidae, the true whelks. It used to be known as Searlesia dira and Buccinum dirum before being transferred to the genus Lirabuccinum.

<i>Vicetia</i> (gastropod) Genus of cowrie from the Eocene of Europe and Pakistan

Vicetia is a genus of cowrie from the Eocene of Europe and Pakistan. Five species are currently recognized with all European forms forming a single anagenetic lineage progressively growing bigger and developing stronger ornamentation. The last known species, V. bizzottoi, is the biggest known cowrie known to science with a shell length of 33.5 cm. They were likely feeding on sponges or algae and went extinct following widespread climate change at the end of the Eocene, giving way for more derived lineages of cowries.

References

  1. "Lophospiridae (Family)". BayScience Foundation, Inc. Retrieved 5 November 2010.
  2. Kues S. & Batten R. L. (2001). "Middle Pennsylvanian gastropods from the Flechado Formation, north-central New Mexico". Journal of Paleontology 75(1, supp): 1-95.
  3. de Koninck L. G. (1883). "Faune du calcaire carbonifère de la Belgique, 4e partie, Gastéropodes (suite en fin)". Musée Royale d’Historie Naturelle Belgique Annales, Série Paléontoloque8: 1-240. page 64.
  4. National Audubon Society Field Guide to Fossils (408)
  5. "Worthenia." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 04 Nov. 2010.