Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Epibiont Guilds As Paleoecological Tools In Environmental Analysis: An Example From Modern And Ordovician Shell Substrates, Stacy M. Boore

Honors Papers

Paleocommunities of encrusting organisms exhibit characteristics that allow comparisons of modern and fossil systems and subsequent environmental analyses. Encrusting organisms attach to a substrate that is generally limited in area. Interactions between bionts and the host organism, and bionts and the environment, are preserved on epibiont encrusted fossils. Modern biont communities from known environments can be compared to fossil biont communities in order to determine the ancient environment experienced by that fossil. Using epibionts as a tool in paleo-environmental analyses employs the somewhat problematic idea that the present can be used as a key to the past. I suggest that …