It dates back to around 180 million years ago and literally killed the fish that ate it. Let’s talk about a fossil that surprised scientists from all over the world.
After seeing the largest ammonite fossil ever found, this time inside the fossilized fish, the researchers have even found a specimen inside a fish. The particularity? The fossil shows very few signs of digestionindicating that it is probably the main cause of death of the fish that swallowed it.
Specifically, it is an ammonite about 10 centimeters in diameter, formally named SMNS 52472. The authors of the study published in the journal Geological Magazinethey also state that the fish swallowed the ammonite almost certainly by accidentnot really realizing what he was “eating”. But how did this mysterious death happen?
To explain it to us, the research team has even created a real comic visible in the link below, thanks to which we can finally understand the tragic events.
“The stomach of the fish provided a microenvironment that protects the aragonite (a mineral that ammonite is made of) by chemical dissolution. The exceptional preservation of the shell aragonite which retains a partial nacreous sheen, combined with only a minor acid etching of the shell, strongly indicates that the ammonite was ingested immediately before and was directly responsible for the death of the fish“.
The unfortunate fish is instead a Pachycormus macropterus and is thought to date from a period dating back to the former Jurassic also known as Toarciano, between 174 and 182 million years ago. Its fossilized remains were recovered from the Posidonienschiefer Formation of Germany.
This fossil also represents the first direct evidence of an actinopterygic fish (aka a bony fish) that feeds on an ammonite. The well-known lionfish perfectly represent a modern example of actinopterygian fish.
Once again, after observing a 240 million year old fossil decapitated, the past gives us quite a bizarre story to talk about.