#carpoid

[transparentfossil]

7.2" Fossil Brittle Star (Ophiura) With Carpoids - Morocco

[aquaticpaleo]

Finally a blog that understands. Creatures were just built different back then huh

carpoids are the greatest of all bois (vertebrates?)

they really dont make em like they used to

[alphynix]

Syringocrinus paradoxicus from the Upper Ordovician of North America (~450 mya). Measuring up to around 6cm long (2.3″), it was part of an extinct group of marine animals known as solutes -- characterized by irregularly-shaped bodies covered in calcite armor plates, the structure of which suggest they were echinoderms despite their complete lack of any proper symmetry.

It had two appendages, one a short “arm” that was probably used for feeding on food particles suspended in the water, and the other forming a longer stalk-like “tail” that may have served to propel it along the seafloor.

Solutes were once thought to be closely related to the equally weird-looking stylophorans, but some versions of the echinoderm family tree place them much further apart, suggesting their superficial similarities may have been due to convergent evolution instead.

[transparentfossil]

5.2" Ordovician Carpoid Fossil - Ktaoua Formation, Morocco

[transparentfossil]

8" Fossil Brittle Star (Ophiura) With Carpoid - Morocco

[palaeopedia]

The Bundenbach Carpoid, Rhenocystis latipedunculata (1960)

Phylum : Echinodermata Class : Stylophora Genus : Rhenocystits Species : R. latipedunculata

Early Devoninan

5 cm long (size)

Germany (map)

Rhenocystis latipedunculata is usually classified as an anomalocystoid mitrate carpoid, with the term mitrate deriving from the carpoid’s shape having resemblance to a bishop’s mitre. The carpoid's body itself was supported by an external skeleton of calcitic plates similar to those found in extant echinoderms. They possessed a spiny tail they are thought to have used to push through the soft, muddy sea bottom. While these animals remain enigmatic, one theory posits that a carpoid might be the common ancestor of echinoderms and vertebrates; this theory is based, in part, on the a unique metazoan trait of some carpoids, complete body plan asymmetry, which is not shared with any other animal, living and extinct.