Traces of predation/parasitism recorded in Eocene brachiopods from the Castle Hayne Limestone, North Carolina, USA

Abstract

Schimmel, M., Kowalewski, M. & Coffey, BP. 2011: Traces of predation/parasitism recorded in Eocene brachiopods from the Castle Hayne Limestone, North Carolina, USA. Lethaia, Vol. 45, pp. 274–289. The Castle Hayne Limestone (Middle Eocene, North Carolina), noted for its diverse macro‐invertebrate fossils, was sampled to assess if Early Cenozoic brachiopods from eastern North America record any traces of biotic interactions. Systematic surveys of two North Carolina quarries yielded 494 brachiopods dominated by one species: Plicatoria wilmingtonensis (Lyell and Sowerby, 1845). Despite subtle variations in taphonomy, taxonomy and drilling patterns, the two sampled quarries are remarkably similar in terms of quantitative and qualitative palaeoecological and taphonomic patterns. In both quarries, brachiopods contain frequent drillholes (24.5% specimens drilled). The majority of drillholes were singular, perpendicular to shell surface and drilled from the outside. Ventral valves were drilled slightly more frequently than dorsal ones, but site‐selectivity in drilhole location was not evident. Larger brachiopods were drilled significantly more frequently than smaller ones. However, drillhole diameter did not correlate with brachiopod size. The drillholes are interpreted as records of ‘live‐live’ biotic interactions, representing either predatory attacks or parasitic infestations or a combination of those two types of interactions. A notable fraction of specimens bear multiple drillholes, which is consistent with either parasitic nature of interactions or frequent failed predatory events. The high drilling frequency reported here reinforces other reports (from other continents and other epochs of the Cenozoic), which suggest that brachiopods may be an important prey or host of drilling organisms in some settings. The number of case studies reporting high frequencies of drilling in brachiopods is still limited and thus insufficient to draw reliable generalizations regarding the causes and consequences of these occasionally intense ecological interactions. □Brachiopods, drilling parasitism, drilling predation, Eocene, North Carolina, taphonomy.

Predation in the marine fossil record: Studies, data, recognition, environmental factors, and behavior

“…Predatory and parasitic drill holes are particularly challenging to differentiate when found in assemblages that include both parasitic and predatory drillers and also in the early Phanerozoic when representatives of modern driller groups were absent (Table 2). Many studies have attempted to differentiate the two types of culprits with varying levels of detail (Ausich and Gurrola, 1979;Baumiller, 2003bBaumiller, , 1990Baumiller et al, 1999;Brett, 2003;Daley, 2008;Hoffmeister et al, 2003;Kier, 1981;Klompmaker et al, 2016a;Kowalewski, 2002;Kowalewski et al, 2000;Leighton, 2001;Nebelsick and Kowalewski, 1999;Schimmel et al, 2012). We recognize the following 16 distinguishing criteria (see also Table 3):…”

“…Mollusks tend to possess more soft tissue than similar-sized brachiopods (Peck, 1993), so that a drill hole in a mollusk is more likely to be predatory than parasitic (but see capulids). Conversely, drill holes in brachiopods have been variously interpreted (Baumiller et al, 2006(Baumiller et al, , 1999Daley, 2008;Harper and Wharton, 2000;Hiller, 2014;Rojas et al, 2017;Schimmel et al, 2012). Compared to mollusks, most crinoids contain little soft tissue (Baumiller, 2003b), and these echinoderms were infested by parasitic…”

“…Ordovician and Devonian brachiopods (Alexander, 1986a;Johnsen et al, 2013;Richards and Leighton, 2012), drill holes in Devonian brachiopods (Sheehan and Lesperance, 1978), repair scars in Middle Ordovician endocerid cephalopods (Kröger, 2011), drill holes in Neogene bivalves (Grey et al, 2006;Leonard-Pingel and Jackson, 2013), and drill holes in Cretaceous and Cenozoic turritellid gastropods (Allmon et al, 1990;Mallick et al, 2013). Another type of proposed size refuge is an increase in the proportion of failed drilling attempts for larger size classes, which was documented for Eocene brachiopods (Schimmel et al, 2012) and Pliocene gastropods (Martinell et al, 2010). However, this lower success rate does not necessarily imply increased safety from predators, because successful predation intensity for large specimens may still be comparable to or greater than that for smaller size classes when larger specimens are attacked more frequently (see for example Schimmel et al, 2012).…”

Traces (ichnospecies Oichnus paraboloides) of predatory gastropods on bivalve shells from the Seogwipo Formation, Jejudo, Korea

“…The preyepredator interactions have been extensively studied in the modern benthic realm (e.g. Schimmel et al 2012) and even in the fossil record for which direct observations are unavailable (Bromley 1981;Ceranka and Złotnik 2003;Kitchell et al 1981;Kowalewski 2004;Leighton 2002). Among the most extensively studied indicators of biotic relationships, in the fossil record, are predatory drilling holes, which have provided various aspects of the past preyepredator interactions (Baumiller 1996;Kelley and Hansen 2003;Kitchell 1986;Kowalewski 2002;Kowalewski et al 1998;Ottens et al 2012;Rohr 1991;Vermeij 1987).…”

Geographic variation of parasitic and predatory traces on mollusks in the northern Adriatic Sea, Italy: implications for the stratigraphic paleobiology of biotic interactions

“…Parasitism is ubiquitous in the biosphere and yet, by contrast with predation, we know very little of its history in the fossil record. Most reports of parasitism in the fossil record are based on specimens of exceptional preservation (Moodie 1923; Cameron 1967; Fry and Moore 1969; Conway Morris 1981, 1990; Savazzi 1995; Feldmann 1998; Feldmann and Brett 1998; Boucot and Poinar 2010) and are rarely based on systematic surveys with large sample sizes (though see Brett 1978; Ruiz and Lindberg 1989; Baumiller and Gahn 2002; Gahn and Baumiller 2003; Schimmel et al 2012; Huntley and Scarponi 2012).…”