Kennedy Range, north of Merlinleigh Homestead (Eocene of Australia)

Where: Western Australia, Australia (24.3° S, 115.2° E: paleocoordinates 47.8° S, 100.6° E)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• hand sample-level geographic resolution

When: Merlinleigh Sandstone Formation, Lutetian (47.8 - 41.3 Ma)

• From the presence of foraminifers Maslinella chapmani Glaessner and Wade, Operculina sp., Crespinina kingscotensis Wade and Rotalia sp., Cockbain (1981) confirmed a Late Eocene age for the Merlinleigh Sandstone, correlated in part with the Late Eocene Giralia Calcarenite of the Carnarvon Basin. Giralia Calcarenite later assigned Middle Eocene (Lutetian) age, Zone P12 of Berggren & Miller (1988).

• group of beds-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: shoreface; poorly lithified, ferruginous, cherty/siliceous sandstone

• Plant debris in the Merlinleigh Sandstone includes araucarian cones, proteaceous leaves, wood, a Banksia fructescence and other material (McLoughlin and Hill 1996). This, in close association with an assortment of marine fossils dominated by disarticulated bivalves from a shallow sandy infaunal habitat, poorly sorted coarse sandstone and conglomerate, and localised concentrations of plant material, including teredine-bored wood indicates a depositional environment featuring "local rivers in flood, depositing the poorly sorted sands and the plant material close to a marine sand bar" (McNamara and Scott 1983: pp. 186–187). The presence of rare very worn and damaged specimens of a turbinid gastropod and limpet are indications of transport of specimens from some distant rocky or hard ground habitat. The Aturia specimens suggest strandings on a shallow beach exposed to the open ocean; the extensive damage to almost all the specimens, particularly to the body chamber, suggests some kind of predation at sea involving large fish or cetaceans.

Size class: macrofossils

Preservation: replaced with silica

Collection methods: surface (float),

• Repository: University of Western Australia

Primary reference: C. Teichert. 1944. The genus Aturia in the Tertiary of Australia. Journal of Paleontology 18:73-82 [M. Clapham/M. Clapham]more details

Purpose of describing collection: taxonomic analysis

PaleoDB collection 179819: authorized by Matthew Clapham, entered by Matthew Clapham on 02.07.2016

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Show authors, comments, and common names
Cephalopoda
 Nautilida - Aturiidae
Aturia clarkei n. sp.
Aturia clarkei n. sp. Teichert 1944 nautiloid