Description
Problematica
Hurdiid radiodont appendages
Middle Cambrian
Spence Shale Member, Langston Formation
Wellsville Mountains, Box Elder County, UT.
18mm appendages on 115mm slab.
Hurdiidae. Arthropod. Soft-bodied.
Here’s another oddball creature from the Cambrian you might not have heard of. The Hurdiidae is a family of radiodonts which have been described as “stem-group arthropods.” That means they are more closely-related to the ancestor of arthropods than they are to other phyla.
Radiodonts are known from the Cambrian to the Devonian with Anomalocaris being the best known genus of the group. As with that animal, the specimens collected tend to be just isolated appendages and this slab, which has the largest specimens we have, is no exception.
