It's amazing!
The Messer Fossil Pit in Germany is an abandoned bitumen shale mine, but in the early 20th century it was famous for unearthing many fossils, where a 47 million-year-old pregnant mare was found, possibly drinking water by the lake, and unfortunately inhaling deadly volcanic gas poisoning.
Another of the more famous fossils is the fossil of turtle mating, in general, fossils can only preserve the skeletal structure of organisms, it is difficult to record the state of life and other more information, but the special feature of this fossil is that it records the process of early turtle mating.
Through the fossils, scientists have found that the male's tail is under the female's, and the two tails are aligned, which is in line with the turtle's mating state. This fossil is also the first time in history that an ancient turtle has been found to be in a mating state, which is of great help to study the living habits and habits of turtles, and scientists are very interested in it.
How are rare fossils formed?
In general, the remains of many organisms cannot form fossils, and after the death of organisms, their remains will be destroyed by carnivores or scavengers, and even bones will be destroyed.
Even if it is not destroyed by scavengers, after the organism dies, it will be quickly decomposed by microorganisms, and naturally degraded in the process of sun and wind, and the energy will flow back into the earth to nourish other life.
The formation of fossils is inseparable from specific conditions, and it can even be said that they are very harsh conditions.
- Conditions of the organism itself:
Organisms with hard bodies are more likely to be preserved as fossils, such as: shells, vertebrate bones, teeth, etc., because the main component of hard objects is minerals, and the ability to resist external damage is stronger.
- Conditions for the preservation of biological remains:
It is best to be in the case of slow water flow speed, PH value greater than 7.8, anaerobic and other environments, otherwise the water flow speed is faster, the remains are easily dispersed and destroyed by flowing water; in the acidic environment, when the PH value is less than 7.8, the hard body composed of calcium carbonate is easily dissolved. In an aerobic environment, the remains are easily decomposed by microorganisms or other organisms, and it is difficult to preserve them as fossils.
- Burial conditions:
Different sediments form different fossils, for example: in amber and permafrost environment, the remains are difficult to decompose, the preservation conditions are better, and even show instantaneous activity before death.
Scientists have found many interesting insect behaviors in amber, such as: the moment of takeoff, mating, etc., for scientists studying insects, if they can find an interesting new discovery in amber, it may bring breakthroughs.
In the Siberian permafrost, people have found mammoth, cave bears, cave lions, wolf cubs, foals and other large biological remains, and these remains are very well preserved, difficult to preserve hair and skin, etc. are very well preserved, and even the stomach contents are well preserved, which is also conducive to scientists to carry out new research on them.
- Time Factor:
Only soon after the death of the creature, the buried remains are likely to become fossils. And the formation time of fossils is very long, and many biological remains have been destroyed in the process of burial, and only a very small part has been petrified and preserved as remains.
The two turtles were able to form fossils and have been preserved for 47 million years, partly because they would mate in the shallow waters of the lake and fall to the bottom of the lake after death. Among them, the oxygen at the bottom of the lake is scarce, which can isolate microbial activity.
Although the two turtles suffered misfortune, their deaths just met the conditions for forming fossils, and scientists believe that this is an inland lake, the water has not flowed for a long time, and the body has not been washed away.
After the two turtles died, they sank to the deeper bottom of the lake, because the bottom of the lake was deprived of oxygen, they were not oxidized and decayed, but deposited here layer by layer with other sediments.
Coupled with the fact that the shells and bones of turtles are very hard, which is also conducive to the formation of fossils, their remains have been preserved for 47 million years, still maintaining their pre-death behavior.
This fossil is very rare, it records not only the physical characteristics of prehistoric creatures, but also the behavior, which is very important for studying the behavioral activities of turtles.
Information from the turtle fossil record
In fact, scientists found 9 pairs of turtle fossils in the Mesar fossil pit, at first, people thought that the turtles were fighting, but later found that the two sides "fighting" each other had a longer tail and a shorter one, indicating that they were flirting with a couple.
Among the 9 pairs of fossils, one of them just happened to be in the mating state, the tail of the turtle and the tail of the female turtle were exactly in a straight line, and this feature was the feature that only had when mating, from which it can be judged that the 9 pairs of turtles that appeared in the Mesar fossil pit were actually in the mating period, but unfortunately encountered an accident and were buried after becoming fossils and preserved.
By studying these turtle fossils, the researchers believe that the skin of these turtles can absorb oxygen, and they will slowly sink from the surface of the water to the bottom of the lake during mating.
However, there is volcanic activity at the bottom of the lake where they live, the volcano will release toxic gases, and as the turtle sinks to the bottom of the sea, they absorb less and less oxygen, but more and more toxic substances, which eventually leads to both poisoning and death, so that so many turtles in the mating or courtship period are buried.
This information not only helped scientists study the mating behavior of early turtles, but also helped to study the local ecological environment, climatic characteristics, etc. 47 million years ago, helping scientists reconstruct the ecosystem at that time, this information is very important, so scientists are very interested in this type of fossil.
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