Bellerophontidae
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Subfamily Bellerophontinae:
Subfamily Bucaniinae |
The Bellerophontidae are a family of globose and specialised bellerophonts that appeared during the Ordovician period and continued through to the Triassic. The shell resembles a miniature Nautilus, with greatly overlapping, rounded whorls, in which the last whorl completely encompasses the others, leaving either a very narrow umbilicus on either side, or none at all. At the aperture of the shell is a slit, which results in a sort of low ridge that runs along the length of shell. The shell has a low profile and it is possible that these were active, fast-moving molluscs.
Knight et al 1960 in the Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology consider the Bellerophontidae a very large family made up of a number of subfamilies and tribes. The classification presented is as follows:
- Family Bellerophontidae McCoy 1851
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- Subfamily Tropidodiscinae Knight 1956
- Subfamily Bucaniinae Ulrich & Scofield 1897
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- Tribe Bucaniides Ulrich & Scofield 1897
- Tribe Salpingostomatides Koken 1925
Recently Peter Wagner has presented cladograms which divide this assemblage into a number of different groups, as well as combining the Bellerophontidae with the family Sinuitidae.
[edit] References
- Knight, J. B., Cox, L. R., Keen, A. M., Batten, R. L., Yochelson, E. L., and Robertson, R. (1960). Systematic descriptions [Archaeogastropoda]. In Moore, R. C. (ed.) Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology. Part I. Mollusca 1, Geological Society of America and Kansas University Press, Colorado and Kansas.
- Linsley, R. M. 1978. Locomotion rates and shell form in the gastropoda. Malacologia 17, 193-206
- Moore, R.C., Lalicker, C.G., and Fischer, A. G., (1952), Invertebrate Fossils, McGraw Hill Book Company, New York; 766 pp.
- Wagner, P. J. (2001) Gastropod phylogenetics: progress, problems and implications. Journal of Paleontology 75: 1128 - 1140
- ----- [no date]. Systematic Paleontology of the Earliest Gastropods (Including Family and Genus Level Stratigraphic Ranges and Synonyms
[edit] External link
- Bellerophontida - Palaeos
