Plumalina plumaria; fossil of a possible hydroid from NEW York, USA
Dimensions:Fossil: 18 (L) x 3.5 (W) cm
Taxonomy
- Attributes
- Objects
- Taxonomy
- Kingdom:
Animalia
- Phylum:
Cnidaria
- Class:
Hydrozoa
- Genus:
Plumalina
- SpecificEpithet:
plumaria
Object number: ROMIP56014-45479
DescriptionThis delicate fossil looks like a feather, but is an exquisitely preserved and unusually large example of a soft-bodied animal that lived in the sea. From the Late Devonian (360 million years old) of New York, it may represent an extinct hydroid—a relative of soft bodied corals and sea anemones. Feathers did not appear until much later, on the feathered dinosaurs and first birds of the Jurassic period, about 150 million years ago.