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Is this plant or animal
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stew22 View Drop Down
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Posts: 5 		Post Options Post Options   Quote stew22 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Is this plant or animal
    Posted: 27 Jan 2010 at 6:30pm
Found at Spurn Point on Humber estuary side. At first thought this was a plant stem, but not sure if it is some type of segmented insect (centipede or millipede). There are ten segments, the end one is bulbous, the front one has what could be mouth parts. Any suggestions what it is?
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Naze Dave View Drop Down
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Posts: 3735 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Naze Dave Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 Jan 2010 at 7:20pm
Hi Stew
Im not quite sure what it is but its certainly not a millipede, it could be a cross section of a crinoid or something but im not sure.
Thanks
Dave
Sea within a sea
What's wrong with white winklepickers...?
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Bill G View Drop Down
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Posts: 2632 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Bill G Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 Jan 2010 at 7:35pm
Hi Stew, welcome to the forum
I don't know the age of the deposit it was found in, but it looks like an internal cast of a plant stem. Commonly called 'horsetail'.
 
Cretaceous example.. Equisitites lyelli, like the ones top left and bottom, with no carbonised wood remaining.
 


Edited by Bill G - 27 Jan 2010 at 11:21pm
Bill
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Tabfish View Drop Down
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Posts: 806 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Tabfish Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 Jan 2010 at 9:11pm
Hello Stew
You have picked up a Lower Jurassic - Middle Lias nodule going by the colour.
I would say the material going across the middle is a mineral deposit (septarian) and the surrounding white lines are actually fossils, bivalves to be more precise.
Have you got a geo hammer? because I would have hit the peice along the line of the deposit as this is a weak spot, with the aim of splitting it in half and seeing what is inside.
 
Tabfish
Tabfish at the Waterside
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Bill G View Drop Down
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Posts: 2632 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Bill G Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 Jan 2010 at 11:22pm
Actually, looking again, I think you may well be right Tabfish.
Bill
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stew22 View Drop Down
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Posts: 5 		Post Options Post Options   Quote stew22 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28 Jan 2010 at 8:31pm
Here are some additional pictures to help with the identification. The comparison with septarian nodules found at the same site shows much larger size, and more regular organised pattern in this specimin. My initial thought was it is some type of horsetail
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Tabfish View Drop Down
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Posts: 806 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Tabfish Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28 Jan 2010 at 10:11pm

Well done stew22 with finding this Lower Jurassic - Middle Lias nodule with evidence of the presence of fossils, when you have collected a few give some of them a 'tap' with a geo hammer, because you never know what's inside, don't forget the safety glasses etc. 

A nodule with Pleuroceras hawskerense showing after I had split it, although the matrix is packed with other fossils.
 
A single Amauroceras lenticulare? rests inside this middle lias peice (12cm)
 
A friend found this bivalve after he gave the rock a 'tap' with his hammer on the beach, sometimes it pays to crack open your find on the beach because if it has nothing inside of it you have no need to carry it home.
 
A middle lias nodule containing a Amaurocers sp ammonite, sometimes you find a lot of middle lias erratics on the beach and then you go collecting again and they have all gone.
 
Tabfish


Edited by Tabfish - 28 Jan 2010 at 10:20pm
Tabfish at the Waterside
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