Sunday, February 7, 2010

Lexington Limestone Scolecodonts

 

My cousin loaned me a Orion MicroXplore MFL-06 since my digital microscope broke.  It has a 4x objective lens with a 10x eyepiece lens.  I used a Kodak LS743 compact camera in macro mode to take images though the eyepiece.  Using Photoshop CS4 processed the images to show on the blog.  I took one shot of a mm scale on a ruler to get a rough idea of scale.  I then used the Photoshop Analysis tool to set a pixel value for 1 mm for the Ruler Tool.  This tool was then used to measure points on some scolecodont fossils.

  
 These fossil remains of an Ordovician Period polychaete annelid worm.  Fossils found in the Lexington Limestone of Franklin County, Kentucky.  Thanks to Herb for the material to study.
  Below is an image to give the reader a perspective as to the size of these fossils and why a microscope is needed to study them.  All the fossils for this post are on that business card.
 

  

  

  

  

  


These last two images I am not sure about.  They might be scolecodont fragments.