fossilized
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...
feces
Feces ( or faeces), known colloquially and in slang as poo and poop, are the solid or semi-solid remains of food that was not digested in the small intestine, and has been broken down by bacteria in the large intestine. Feces contain a relati ...
. Coprolites are classified as
trace fossil
A trace fossil, also known as an ichnofossil (; from el, ἴχνος ''ikhnos'' "trace, track"), is a fossil record of biological activity but not the preserved remains of the plant or animal itself. Trace fossils contrast with body fossils, ...
s as opposed to body fossils, as they give evidence for the animal's behaviour (in this case, diet) rather than
morphology
Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to:
Disciplines
* Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts
* Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies ...
. The name is derived from the
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
words κόπρος (''kopros'', meaning "dung") and λίθος (''lithos'', meaning "stone"). They were first described by
William Buckland
William Buckland Doctor of Divinity, DD, Royal Society, FRS (12 March 1784 – 14 August 1856) was an English theologian who became Dean of Westminster. He was also a geologist and paleontology, palaeontologist.
Buckland wrote the first full ...
in 1829. Before this, they were known as "fossil fir cones" and "
bezoar
A bezoar is a mass often found trapped in the gastrointestinal system, though it can occur in other locations. A pseudobezoar is an indigestible object introduced intentionally into the digestive system.
There are several varieties of bezoar, s ...
stones". They serve a valuable purpose in
paleontology
Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...
because they provide direct evidence of the predation and diet of extinct organisms. Coprolites may range in size from a few millimetres to over 60 centimetres.
Coprolites, distinct from ''
paleofeces
Paleofeces (or palaeofaeces in British English) are ancient human feces, often found as part of archaeological excavations or surveys. The term coprolite is often used interchangeably, although coprolite can also refer to fossilized animal fe ...
'', are fossilized animal dung. Like other fossils, coprolites have had much of their original composition replaced by mineral deposits such as
silicate
In chemistry, a silicate is any member of a family of polyatomic anions consisting of silicon and oxygen, usually with the general formula , where . The family includes orthosilicate (), metasilicate (), and pyrosilicate (, ). The name is al ...
s and calcium carbonates. Paleofeces, on the other hand, retain much of their original organic composition and can be reconstituted to determine their original chemical properties, though in practice the term coprolite is also used for ancient human faecal material in archaeological contexts.
Initial discovery
British fossil hunter
Mary Anning
Mary Anning (21 May 1799 – 9 March 1847) was an English fossil collector, dealer, and palaeontologist who became known around the world for the discoveries she made in Jurassic marine fossil beds in the cliffs along the English Channel ...
noticed as early as 1824 that " bezoar stones" were often found in the abdominal region of
ichthyosaur
Ichthyosaurs (Ancient Greek for "fish lizard" – and ) are large extinct marine reptiles. Ichthyosaurs belong to the order known as Ichthyosauria or Ichthyopterygia ('fish flippers' – a designation introduced by Sir Richard Owen in 1842, altho ...
skeletons found in the
Lias
Lias may refer to:
Geology
* Lias Formation, a geologic formation in France
*Lias Group, a lithostratigraphic unit in western Europe
* Early Jurassic, an epoch
People
* Godfrey Lias, British author
* Mohd Shamsudin Lias (born 1953), Malaysian ...
formation at
Lyme Regis
Lyme Regis is a town in west Dorset, England, west of Dorchester and east of Exeter. Sometimes dubbed the "Pearl of Dorset", it lies by the English Channel at the Dorset–Devon border. It has noted fossils in cliffs and beaches on the Herita ...
. She also noted that if such stones were broken open they often contained fossilized fish bones and scales as well as sometimes bones from smaller ichthyosaurs. These observations by Anning led the geologist William Buckland to propose in 1829 that the stones were fossilized
feces
Feces ( or faeces), known colloquially and in slang as poo and poop, are the solid or semi-solid remains of food that was not digested in the small intestine, and has been broken down by bacteria in the large intestine. Feces contain a relati ...
and name them coprolites. Buckland also suspected that the spiral markings on the fossils indicated that ichthyosaurs had spiral ridges in their intestines similar to those of modern sharks and that some of these coprolites were black with ink from swallowed
belemnite
Belemnitida (or the belemnite) is an extinct order of squid-like cephalopods that existed from the Late Triassic to Late Cretaceous. Unlike squid, belemnites had an internal skeleton that made up the cone. The parts are, from the arms-most to ...
s.
Research value
By examining coprolites,
paleontologists
Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...
are able to find information about the diet of the animal (if bones or other food remains are present), such as whether it was a
herbivore
A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthpart ...
or a
carnivore
A carnivore , or meat-eater (Latin, ''caro'', genitive ''carnis'', meaning meat or "flesh" and ''vorare'' meaning "to devour"), is an animal or plant whose food and energy requirements derive from animal tissues (mainly muscle, fat and other sof ...
, and the
taphonomy
Taphonomy is the study of how organisms decay and become fossilized or preserved in the paleontological record. The term ''taphonomy'' (from Greek , 'burial' and , 'law') was introduced to paleontology in 1940 by Soviet scientist Ivan Efremov t ...
of the coprolites, although the producer is rarely identified unambiguously, especially with more ancient examples. In some instances, knowledge about the anatomy of animals' digestive tracts can be helpful in assigning a coprolite to the animal that produced it, one example being the finding that the
Triassic
The Triassic ( ) is a geologic period and system which spans 50.6 million years from the end of the Permian Period 251.902 million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Jurassic Period 201.36 Mya. The Triassic is the first and shortest period ...
dinosauriform
Dinosauromorpha is a clade of avemetatarsalian archosaurs (reptiles closer to birds than to crocodilians) that includes the Dinosauria (dinosaurs) and some of their close relatives. It was originally defined to include dinosauriforms and lager ...
''
Silesaurus
''Silesaurus'' is a genus of silesaurid dinosauriform from the Late Triassic, of what is now Poland.
Discovery
Fossilized remains of ''Silesaurus'' have been found in the Keuper Claystone in Krasiejów near Opole, Silesia, Poland, which is al ...
'' may have been an insectivore, a suggestion which was based on the beak-like jaws of the animal and the high density of beetle remains found in associated coprolites. Further, coprolites can be analyzed for certain minerals that are known to exist in trace amounts in certain species of plant that can still be detected millions of years later. In rare cases, coprolites have even been found to contain well-preserved insect remains.
Recognizing coprolites
The recognition of coprolites is aided by their structural patterns, such as spiral or annular markings, content, undigested food fragments, and associated fossil remains. The smallest coprolites are often difficult to distinguish from inorganic pellets or from eggs. Most coprolites are composed chiefly of calcium
phosphate
In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid .
The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...
, along with minor quantities of
organic matter
Organic matter, organic material, or natural organic matter refers to the large source of carbon-based compounds found within natural and engineered, terrestrial, and aquatic environments. It is matter composed of organic compounds that have c ...
. By analyzing coprolites, it is possible to infer the diet of the animal which produced them.
Coprolites have been recorded in deposits ranging in age from the
Cambrian
The Cambrian Period ( ; sometimes symbolized C with bar, Ꞓ) was the first geological period of the Paleozoic Era, and of the Phanerozoic Eon. The Cambrian lasted 53.4 million years from the end of the preceding Ediacaran Period 538.8 million ...
period to recent times and are found worldwide. Some of them are useful as
index fossil
Biostratigraphy is the branch of stratigraphy which focuses on correlating and assigning relative ages of rock Stratum, strata by using the fossil assemblages contained within them.Hine, Robert. “Biostratigraphy.” ''Oxford Reference: Dictiona ...
s, such as ''Favreina'' from the
Jurassic
The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately Mya. The J ...
period of
Haute-Savoie
Haute-Savoie (; Arpitan: ''Savouè d'Amont'' or ''Hiôta-Savouè''; en, Upper Savoy) or '; it, Alta Savoia. is a department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of Southeastern France, bordering both Switzerland and Italy. Its prefecture is ...
in
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
.
Some marine deposits contain a high proportion of fecal remains. However, animal excrement is easily fragmented and destroyed, so usually has little chance of becoming fossilized.
Coprolite mining
In 1842 the Rev
John Stevens Henslow
John Stevens Henslow (6 February 1796 – 16 May 1861) was a British priest, botanist and geologist. He is best remembered as friend and mentor to his pupil Charles Darwin.
Early life
Henslow was born at Rochester, Kent, the son of a solici ...
, a professor of Botany at
St John's College, Cambridge
St John's College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge founded by the House of Tudor, Tudor matriarch Lady Margaret Beaufort. In constitutional terms, the college is a charitable corpo ...
, discovered coprolites just outside
Felixstowe
Felixstowe ( ) is a port town in Suffolk, England. The estimated population in 2017 was 24,521. The Port of Felixstowe is the largest container port in the United Kingdom. Felixstowe is approximately 116km (72 miles) northeast of London.
His ...
in
Suffolk
Suffolk () is a ceremonial county of England in East Anglia. It borders Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south; the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich; other important towns include Lowes ...
in the villages of
Trimley St Martin
Trimley St. Martin is a parish and village that lies between the rivers Orwell and the Deben, on the long narrow tongue of land from Ipswich to Felixstowe referred to as the Colneis Hundred.
The village, and its neighbour Trimley St. Mary, are ...
,
Falkenham
Falkenham is a village and a civil parish in the East Suffolk district, in the English county of Suffolk, near the village of Kirton and the towns of Ipswich and Felixstowe. The population of the civil parish as of the 2011 census was 170.
De ...
and Kirton and investigated their composition. Realising their potential as a source of available phosphate once they had been treated with
sulphuric acid
Sulfuric acid (American spelling and the preferred IUPAC name) or sulphuric acid ( Commonwealth spelling), known in antiquity as oil of vitriol, is a mineral acid composed of the elements sulfur, oxygen and hydrogen, with the molecular formu ...
, he patented an extraction process and set about finding new sources.
Very soon, coprolites were being mined on an industrial scale for use as
fertiliser
A fertilizer (American English) or fertiliser (British English; see spelling differences) is any material of natural or synthetic origin that is applied to soil or to plant tissues to supply plant nutrients. Fertilizers may be distinct from ...
due to their high
phosphate
In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthophosphoric acid .
The phosphate or orthophosphate ion is derived from phospho ...
content. The major area of extraction occurred over the east of England, centred on
Cambridgeshire
Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...
and the
Isle of Ely
The Isle of Ely () is a historic region around the city of Ely in Cambridgeshire, England. Between 1889 and 1965, it formed an administrative county.
Etymology
Its name has been said to mean "island of eels", a reference to the creatures that ...
with its refining being carried out in
Ipswich
Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line r ...
Coprolite Street
Coprolite Street is a street in Ipswich, Suffolk in the Waterfront area. It runs from Duke Street to Neptune Marina, the former Orwell Quay. It was named after the factory which processed coprolite, or fossilised faeces
Feces ( or faeces ...
near
Ipswich dock
The Ipswich Docks, Ipswich wet dock and the wet dock,) are a series docks in Port of Ipswich located at a bend of the River Orwell which has been used for trade since at least the 8th Century. A wet dock was constructed in 1842 which was 'the big ...
s where the Fisons works once stood.
The industry declined in the 1880s but was revived briefly during the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
to provide phosphates for munitions. A renewed interest in coprolite mining in the First World War extended the area of interest into parts of
Buckinghamshire
Buckinghamshire (), abbreviated Bucks, is a ceremonial county in South East England that borders Greater London to the south-east, Berkshire to the south, Oxfordshire to the west, Northamptonshire to the north, Bedfordshire to the north-ea ...
as far west as
Woburn Sands
Woburn Sands () is a town that straddles the border between Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire in England, and also is part of the Milton Keynes urban area. See map. The larger part of the town is in Woburn Sands civil parish, which is in the City ...
.
See also
*
Bromalite
Bromalites are the fossilized remains of material sourced from the digestive system of organisms. As such, they can be broadly considered to be trace fossils. The most well-known types of bromalites are fossilized faeces or coprolites
A co ...
*
Fecalith
A fecalith is a stone made of feces. It is a hardening of feces into lumps of varying size and may occur anywhere in the intestinal tract but is typically found in the colon. It is also called appendicolith when it occurs in the appendix and is ...
*
Fossil
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...
Gastrolith
A gastrolith, also called a stomach stone or gizzard stone, is a rock held inside a gastrointestinal tract. Gastroliths in some species are retained in the muscular gizzard and used to grind food in animals lacking suitable grinding teeth. In othe ...
*
Guano
Guano (Spanish from qu, wanu) is the accumulated excrement of seabirds or bats. As a manure, guano is a highly effective fertilizer due to the high content of nitrogen, phosphate, and potassium, all key nutrients essential for plant growth. G ...
The World of Poo
''The World of Poo'' is an illustrated children's book written by Terry Pratchett and illustrated by Peter Dennis. It is based on the book featured in Pratchett's ''Discworld'' novel ''Snuff'', in which Sam Vimes reads it to his now older son, r ...
''
*
Petrifaction
In geology, petrifaction or petrification () is the process by which organic material becomes a fossil through the replacement of the original material and the filling of the original pore spaces with minerals. Petrified wood typifies this proce ...
*
Petrified wood
Petrified wood, also known as petrified tree (from Ancient Greek meaning 'rock' or 'stone'; literally 'wood turned into stone'), is the name given to a special type of ''fossilized wood'', the fossilized remains of terrestrial vegetation. ''P ...