Modern Day Crinoid

Yesterday, I got to tour the Indiana University Southeast Geosciences Department. Toward the end of our tour, we went into one of the labs and one the shelf was a jar with a clear preservative. In the jar was this white crinoid which were told was found in about 400 feet of water off the coast of Florida. It was interesting to see a creature that usually is only found as fossil.

Some of the images are not too clear since I had low lighting and was taking pictures through a jar filled with liquid.

(UPDATED: 09/12/2010)
Here are pictures of a modern day sea lily/crinoid (Metacrinus rotundus) of the phylum Echinodermata.  Pictures taken in August 2010 at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.

I include some pictures for Mississippian Period (Lower Carboniferous) crinoid stems from the Fort Payne Formation located at Lake Cumberland, Kentucky.

Recent Finds: Corals and Brachiopods

The following pictures are variety of fossils that can be found around the Louisville, Kentucky area. There are fossils from three different time periods represented.

The image has a button coral Hadrophyllum with a Silurian sponge in the bottom of the frame.

This picture is of two Devonian knee cap corals or Favosites turbinatus.

This is an unknown Devonian horn coral.

Another unknown horn coral is a grey rock. The coral was filled will a grey clay like mud before it was cleaned out.

Probably a Devonian Period Emmonsia tuberosa coral.

Silurian Period Halysites chain coral.

Devonian coral I have not identified.

A variety of Devonian brachiopods.

A number of corals and sponges.

Ordovician Calcite Brachiopod

Here are some Ordovician Period brachiopods from eastern Jefferson County, Kentucky. I picked out some that have some exposed calcite. I originally posted this as quartz but a KYANA member Charlie informed me that quartz is rare in Upper Ordovician Period fossils. After doing a scratch test with a pen knife, it showed it was not quartz. The white vinegar test proved inconclusive.