Invertebrate Paleontology Database
Data about all cataloged specimens in the Invertebrate Paleontology research collection is entered into a Specify database. Cataloging of specimens is ongoing.
The data is also sent to:
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iDigBio (Integrated Digitized Biocollections). Click on Search Recordset toward the right side of the screen to see the data.
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GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility). Click on Occurrences toward the right side of the screen to see the data.
Access to the research collection is by appointment, and is available at no cost to qualified researchers with permission of the curator.
Contact the curator for more information.
Invertebrate Paleontology Collection
The Department of Invertebrate Paleontology houses a research collection of invertebrate fossils that has the greatest taxonomic breadth of any collection of the Museum. It houses specimens from many localities in North America as well as Europe, Asia and South America. These include echinoderms from the Hunsrück Slate of Bundenbach, Germany; rare myriapods from Illinois, West Virginia (including the holotype of
Myriacantherpestes clarkorum) and the Dominican Republic; and many other types of fossils. Most specimens in the collection are body fossils, but there are also a large number of trace fossils (ichnofossils).
The collection’s strength is in Ohio fossils. Arthropods and other organisms from the Devonian shales of northeastern Ohio (including the holotype of
Ohiocaris wycoffi) are especially well represented, as are crinoids (including the holotype of
Cuyahogacrinus lodiensis) and other fossils from the Mississippian rocks of the area. Included are more than 21,000 lots, each consisting of one or more specimens with the same catalog number. More than 90,100 specimens are cataloged.
The collection also includes the Barry Miller Collection, formerly housed by Kent State University and consisting primarily of Pleistocene gastropods; part of the Herman Hertzer Collection/Museum from Baldwin Wallace College; part of the Frank Van Horn Collection from Case Institute of Technology; as well as specimens from Oberlin College and Western Reserve University. A large number of Carboniferous specimens collected by John J. Burke, former curator of the department, are also included.
Specimens from the collection have been illustrated and described in articles published in scientific journals and nontechnical publications as well as textbooks. Many, for example, are illustrated in
Fossils of Ohio (Ohio Division of Geological Survey Bulletin 70), the basic reference on Ohio fossils. Others are illustrated in papers published in the
Journal of Paleontology,
Kirtlandia (the scientific publication of the Museum), and other scientific journals, as well as in student theses.
There are 21 holotypes, 24 paratypes, 615 figured specimens and 721 cited specimens (including specimens that are figured) in the collection. These include body fossils from the Chagrin Member of Ohio such as brachiopods, mollusks, crustaceans and tubes of the problematic organism
Sphenothallus. There are also a good number of figured specimens of the problematic organism
Sidetes from the Cleveland Shale, conulariids from diverse localities, crinoids from Ohio, and Pleistocene molluscs from Illinois, Kansas and other western and midwestern states.
The collection also includes large numbers of figured or cited trace fossils from the Chagrin Shale of Ohio, the Mississippian of West Virginia and the Jurassic of New Jersey.
3-dimensional digitization of certain specimens is preceding. View the digital
3-dimensional models created so far.