Palaeontologia africana

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ISSN (print): 0078-8554 ISSN (electronic): 2410-4418 For queries regarding content of Palaeontologia africana collections please contact Jonah Choiniere by email : jonah.choiniere@wits.ac.za or Tel : 011 717 6684

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1975 - 197911990 - 19921

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    Trace fossils in the Ecca of northern Natal and their palaeoenviromental significance
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1975) Hobday, D K; Tavener-Smith, R
    Because of the rarity of body fossils in the Ecca Group fossil burrows, tracks and trails are of potential value in supplementing primary sedimentary evidence concerning the palaeoenvironmental factors of bathymetry, energy level and food supply. The three most important ichnogenera are Skolithos, Corophioides and Scolicia. The first two are restricted to the upper portions or Middle Ecca upward-coarsening regressive cycles attributed to delta progradation. They arc representatives of Seilacher's (1967) Skolithos and Glossijungites communities, indicating shallow water conditions with diastems. Scolicia occurs at lower levels in the cycles and corresponds to Seilacher's deeper water Cruziana community. Meandering trails Helminthopsis and Taphrhelminthopsis in the Lower Ecca belong to Seilacher's deep water Nereites community. Less common ichnogenera include the U-burrows Diplocraterion and Rhizocorallium. It has proved impossible positivelv to identify many trace fossils such as short ramifying burrows, chevron trails, dumbbell-shaped surface impressions, digitate tracks and problematic elliptical casts. Trace fossils have not been recognised with certainty in the fluviatile deposits which comprise the bulk or the coal-bearing strata of northern Natal.
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    Disarticulated remains of an Ordovician metazoan from the Cedarberg Formation, South Africa: a re-interpretation of Eohostimella parva Kovacs
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1992) Chesselet, Pascale
    Small pointed axes previously described as a non-vascular Palaeozoic plant, Eohostimella parva Kovacs 1986, are assigned to Siphonacis parva (Kovacs) Chesselet 1990 n. comb. These carbonaceous compressions are indicator fossils for assemblages of Promissum pulchrum Kovacs 1986, which was initially interpreted as a land plant and is now thought to be a giant conodont. These fossils occur with invertebrates and algae in the Late Ashgillian Soom Shale Member of the Cedarberg Formation, in the Table Mountain Group. E. parva has a distinctive internal structure which invalidates its assignment to Eohostimella Schopf and casts doubt on its placement in the plant kingdom. Presently these small axes are of uncertain affinity although it seems likely that they are the disarticulated remains of a problematic Ordovician metazoan.