PALEOECOLOGY

Definitions
Ecology: interaction of organisms and
their environment

Paleoecology: extension of ecological

principles to the fossil record

Controversy of the 1980s

Valentine et al. Our task is to enumerate
and interpret past communities p. 119

Gould et al. Why bother?

P. 119

Ecology and Paleoecology

Autecology same as functional
morphology (individual behavior) Synecology
Ecology of community of organisms and their relationship to the environment Modern analogues

Temperate Montane Conifer Forest

Temperate Deciduous Forest

Ecology vs. Paleoecology

Taphonomic Considerations
Selective preservation Time averaging Rapid deposition: see infauna below epifauna Slow deposition: mixed infauna with epifauna

Ecology vs. PaleoecologyTaphonomy

Dissolution of shells oyster banks 75% Transportation from original setting

Collection bias

Ecololgy vs. Paleoecology

Complex relationships are not always visible Example from dinoflagellates
Slow sedimentation can mix time and communities

Dinoflagellate Life cycle

Ecology vs. Paleoecology

Example from dinoflagellates
Not all dinos encyst; bias toward encysting species encyst; not what is in total plankton Encystment may mean adverse, not favorable conditions; abundance may not mean good environment Dinos dont encyst at all times may be present but don invisible Slow sedimentation may mix indicators of changing environment rather than a community

Paleoecology
Lines of evidence available
Uniformitarianism in practice Position of creatures in life position; attachments, burrows Associated substrate: rock type (sand, silt) bedrock

Jurassic crustacean burrows in sandstone

Paleoecology
Lines of evidence available
Evidence from association ( who is with whom) Biochemical evidence; isotopes, composition of shells

Ecological Terms
Biosphere area occupied by life (note
subsurface life) Ecosystem (large) physical and biological characteristics of an area Community (large or small) local association of organisms not usually including physical environment, but depending on it.

Ecological Terms continued

Habitat physical environment of an organism
(but can include other organisms) Niche components of physical and biological environment to which an organism is adapted including its role and behavior.
Circular? Does niche exist without the organism? Herbivorous cat niche? Sabertooth cat niche?

Major Marine Environments

Geological (Substrate) Terms

Continental Shelf Continental Slope and Rise Abyssal Plain Trenches and Deeps

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Major Marine Environments

Benthic Marine Biological Environments

Supratidal Intertidal Subtidal (Shelfal) Bathyal Abyssal Hadal

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Major Marine Environments

Marine Realms for Nekton and Plankton

Littoral Neritic Oceanic

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Major Marine Environments

Physical Zones in Water

Photic Zone Aphotic Zone Calcite Compensation Depth 3000-4000m

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Trophic Considerations
Trophic structures
Food chains: photosynthesis at bottom, tigers at the top.

Food Webs p.122

How dependent are they? If you remove one component, will others
die?

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Trophic Considerations
Light
Photosynthesis

Trophic Considerations
Metals and sulfides Chemosynthesis

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Trophic Considerations

Riftia Tube Worms Red Riftia tube worms thrive near a sea vent, even as they are being colonize by equally healthy mussels. Larvae attach themselves to the lava near vents then build long, white tubes as they grow. Each tube absorbs sulfurous water that a sac of bacteria inside the worm uses to generate energy and food for the worm.

Trophic Considerations
Producers
Bacteria Phytoplankton Plants Filter feeders Detritus feeders Scavangers Carnivores

Consumers

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Trophic Considerations
Community = mixture Community of the earth has changed with
time see Ordovician p. 123

Trophic Considerations
Have communities become more complex
in trophic terms through time? What insight can we gain through fossils?

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What would it take to destroy all life on earth?

Environmental Limits and Paleogeography

Temperature
VanHoffs rule biological reaction rates Cold, larger body size

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Environmental Limits and Paleogeography

Paleogeographic provinces next time Fossil Paleothermometers
Foraminifera depth and distance from poles Modern analogues Coiling direction

Fossil Paleothermometers
Reptiles warm regions
Showed that world had warmer conditions in Eocene, also other times

Cretaceous to Eocene Crocodilia

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 Plants
Coals Wolfes leaf shape model

Fossil Paleothermometers
Wiggins angiosperm/sphagnum ratios

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Environmental Limits
Oxygen (life can manage on low oxygen)
Terrestrial air 20.946% Oxygen (Mostly nitrogen) Water, fresh or saline, mixed at surface with air = oxygenated, aerobic aerobic At 400m 1.0ml/l dysaerobic dysaerobic At 600-1000m Oxygen minimum zone anaerobic 600anaerobic Accumulation of organic matter undigested Black shales Petroleum source rocks

Environmental Limits -Oxygen

Oxygen
Deeper than 1000m may be influence by arctic/antarctic flow high oxygen

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Environmental Limits - Oxygen

Freshwater stratification Stagnant bottom waters anaerobic anaerobic Source rocks for oil - Sudan

Environmental Limits
Salinity
Eurohaline organisms Stenohaline organisms Fossils Dinoflagellates Assemblages indicating brackish water
Tend to be mono-specific or several with similar monomorphology

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Lingulodinium polyhedrum in thecate, non preservable stage Forming a red tide.

High Salinity

Lingulodinium macherophorum, cyst of Lingulodinium polyedrum

Medium high salinity

Normal Seawater

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Two species of dinoflagellate cysts in brackish water conditions that occur in floods in fossil record

Environmental Limits
Water Depth
Photic Zone difficult in fossils Carbonate (Calcite) Compensation Depth Concentration of silica shelled organisms (rads) (rads) Fossil indications of water depth Benthic forams Dinoflagellates Brittle Stars and sea cucumbers

Substrate Littoral, sedimentology

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Ynezidinium malloyi Deep water indicator

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Ynezidinium malloyi Deep water indicator

Spiniferella cornuta Shallow water indicator

Direct Evidence from Fossils

Paleobiogeochemisty
Oxygen isotopes Paleothermometer Correlation to plant evidence Carbon isotopes Plants and upwhelling Circulation changes

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Paleoecology and scaling

Food Pyramids
On land low =biomass of plants
High=one tiger to the hill

Marine low=smaller biomass, frequently replaced

High Zooplankton and bottom feeders

Turnover rate drastically different

Food Pyramids Land and Marine

Carnivores

Carnivores

Herbivores

Zooplankton and herbivores

Plants Phytoplankton

Land

Ocean

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Food Pyramids and Endothermy

Bakker used predator/prey ratios as
evidence of dinosaur endothermy Endotherms require more prey, more often than ectotherms. Whole area of ratios is suspect. Why?

Community Succession
Plants pioneer community to
climax community
Autogenic Replacement

Climax Community

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Community Succession
Can we see it in the fossil record? Why?
Why not? Walker and Alberstadt ancient reefs
p. 139

Competition
Gauses Competative Exclusion Principle
Whenever two organisms try to occupy the same niche, they tend to subdivide the niche or one drives the other out.

Brachiopods v. mollusks in the Mesozoic?

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Evolutionary Paleoecology
James Valentine The study of ecological phenomena that
take millions of years
Phanerozoic diversity Onshore-Offshore trends Tiering Escalation

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Phanerozioc diversity
Valentine What is the pattern of diversity
of life?
V. Low in Paleozoic, accelerated rapidly Mesozoic and Cenozoic, highest now

Phanerozoic Diversity
Raup problems
Rock area known Less erosion with younger rock Attention of paleontologists naming,

monographic bursts bursts Counting the present day fauna and few fossil occurences How to solve????

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Phanerozoic Diversity
Bambach
Compare 386 well sampled, well preserved examples Increased diversity through the Phanerozoic, but not as much as Valentine

Sepkoski work on families, not genus

and species p. 143-144
Fell into three main components Cambrian Fauna Paleozoic Fauna Modern Fauna (Present in Paleo., dominant in Paleo.,
Meso and Cenozoic.

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Onshore-Offshore trends
Sepkoskis data base, plus Miller
Depth and substrate information Ecological separation onshore fauna v. offshore fauna Gave explanation to takeover of bivalves and gastropods in the Mesozoic Offshore faunas hit hard by extinction event Bivalves and gastropods filled empty niche

Onshore-Offshore trends
Jablonski and Bottjer
Where do new species/faunas originate more frequently, onshore? Offshore? Where do older faunas remain? Why?

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Tiering
Cambrian
Surface of the sea floor Very shallow burrows Few centimenters above floor Finer scaled subdivision of the water column several meters above seafloor Still no deep burrowers (throughout most of Paleozoic)

Ordovician

Tiering
Late Paleozoic to Mesozoic Cenozoic
Bivalves burrow deep (meter) Giant Crinoids No more giant Crinoids niche empty? Or what? Deep burrowers Modern complex communities compared with early life

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Escalation
Vermeij
When new predators arose, the prey species tended to evolve defenses that protected them. Explanation for the Perm/Triassic turnover to the mollusks? New predators = marine reptiles, bony fish, crustaceans, sea stars. Brachs, unprotected gastropods etc . declined Whose explanation is best?

Escalation
Also provides explanation for increased
diversity in Paleozoic ,i.e., arms race

Combined phenomena of Evolutionary

Paleoecology give insight that modern ecology cannot of relationships and history of life.

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