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A new study reveals that an ancient plant fossil that baffled scientists wasn’t actually a plant after all.
Instead, the small round shape with leaf-like markings was once the shell of a hatchling turtle that lived during the age of dinosaurs. Scientists believe that this turtle speciestart wig” is named after the Pokémon character who is half turtle, half plant.
According to the study authors, the discovery is the first time a hatchling shell has been found in northwestern South America.
Their findings were published Thursday in the journal Old Trogia Electronica.
“In the world of Pokémon, we encounter the concept of combining two or more elements, such as animals, machines, plants, etc.,” said first author Hector Palma, a graduate student in paleobotany at the National University of Colombia. Mr. Castro said: statement.
“So when a fossil is first classified as a plant and then turns out to be a baby turtle, several Pokemon immediately come to mind. In this case, a baby turtle with a leaf on its head, It’s Turtwig.”
But it took some research to solve this paleontological mystery that began decades ago.
It all started when Colombian priest Father Gustavo Huertas discovered fossils in the Paja Formation. This formation is part of Colombia’s geological heritage called the Marine Reptile Lagerstätte. Ricote Alto’s.
Previous fossil discoveries from the site include dinosaurs, plesiosaurs, plesiosaurs, ichthyosaurs, turtles, and crocodilops, which date from the Early Cretaceous Period, 113 to 132 million years ago. It includes a species closely related to crocodiles called morphs.
Huertas collected fossils and rocks at the site near the town of Villa de Leyva from the 1950s to the 1970s. When he found a leaf-patterned rock, he thought it was a plant fossil. Huertas also identified the specimen in a 2003 study as Sphenophyllum colombianum.
But other scientists were surprised to hear that the plant was discovered in northern South America and is between 113 and 132 million years old. Fossil records show that this now-extinct plant was once widespread around the world, but went extinct more than 100 million years ago.
Previous studies on this plant have shown that its leaves are typically wedge-shaped, with veins radiating from the base of the leaf.
Palma Castro and Fabianie Herrera, assistant curator of paleobotany at the Negaunee Integrative Research Center at Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History, were intrigued by the fossil’s age and location.
Herrera collects and studies plants from all over the world. Early Cretaceous (105 to 145 million years ago) northwestern South America, part of the continent where little paleobotanical research has been conducted.
Both fossils, approximately 2 inches (5 centimeters) in diameter, were in the collections of the Faculty of Geosciences at the National University of Colombia. As Herrera and Palma-Castro examined and photographed the fossils, they noticed something odd.
“Upon closer inspection, the lines seen in the fossil do not look like plant veins, which led me to believe that they were most likely bone,” said Herrera, the study’s senior author. said in a statement.
Mr. Herrera contacted his colleague Edwin Alberto Cadena. He is a senior lecturer at Del Rosario University in Bogota, Colombia, and a paleontologist who studies turtles and other vertebrates.
“They sent me a photo and I said, ‘This clearly looks like a shell,’ a bony shell on top of a turtle,” study co-author Cadena said in a statement. “I said, ‘This is remarkable, because not only is this a turtle, but it’s also a hatchling. It’s very, very small.'”
Cadena and one of his students, Diego Comvita Romero, from the National University of Colombia, compared the fossils to the shells of other extinct and modern turtles.
“When we first saw the specimen, we were surprised because the fossil lacked the typical markings on the outside of a turtle’s shell,” study co-author Comvita Romero said in a statement. “It was slightly concave, like a bowl. At that moment, we realized that the visible part of the fossil was the other side of the shell, and we were looking at a part of the shell that was inside the turtle. ”
While analyzing the shell, researchers determined that the turtle was no more than a year old at the time of death.
As young turtles grow older, their growth rate and size can change, Comvita Romero said. However, fossils of young turtles are rarely found because the bones in their shells are very thin.
“These turtles are likely relatives of other Cretaceous species that can reach lengths of 15 feet, but we don’t know much about how they actually grew to such enormous sizes.” Cadena said in a statement.
The researchers did not accuse Huertas of incorrectly classifying the fossil as a plant. What he thought were leaves and stems were actually vertebrae and ribs inside a turtle’s shell.
“We solved a small puzzle in paleobotany, but more importantly, this study points to the need to re-study Colombia’s historical collections. “It’s a critical time,” Herrera said.
The research team’s next goal is to understand what forests once grew in the area, he said.
“Paleontology constantly tests your imagination and your ability to wonder,” says Palma-Castro. “Discoveries like this are truly special because they not only expand our knowledge of the past, but also open a window into the diverse possibilities of what we can discover.”