#heteromorph ammonite

[transparentfossil]

[swatch-this]

What could possibly be the evolutionary reason behind developing those wack ass shells😭

[bmepa]

Polnareff (I love Polnareff) and heteromorph ammonites (as omanytes) (I love heteromorph ammonites) and Vaporeon (I love vaporeons)

They're so silly how did those things really exist

Beloved

[cartooningsss]

[zombiestarillustration]

Heteromorph Ammonite shells always look like wizard hats to me, and so here are a few varieties depicted as anthropomorphic wizards. Once I have a reliable printing set up I hope to compile these, along with seven other wizard designs, into a zine.

[alphynix]

Strange Symmetries #16: Go Home Heteromorphs You're Drunk

Most ammonites had spiral-coiling shells, but during the Cretaceous a group known as the heteromorphs evolved a much weirder range of forms. Some were straightened, some were hooked, some had helical snail-like shapes, and some even ended up bearing a strange resemblance to paperclips. 

But one of the most bizarre of all was the genus Nipponites, whose ribbed shell looked like a bundle of tangled asymmetrical coils.

Nipponites bacchus lived in what is now Hokkaido, Japan, during the late Cretaceous about 90 million years ago. Around 10cm long (~4"), its shell was less tightly coiled up than its better-known relative Nipponites mirabilis, but these looser whorls were formed in the same way via a series of U-bends in different directions during its growth.

Despite their irregular and ungainly appearance, the unique shape of these ammonites seems to have actually been very hydrodynamically stable. They weren't fast-moving, but they didn't need to be, probably spending most of their time floating suspended in the water column catching small planktonic prey from around themselves.

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[transparentfossil]

Anetoceras Heteromorph Ammonite

[transparentfossil]

Spiny heteromorph ammonite – Crioceras