4.4" Fossil Ammonite (Orthosphinctes) - Germany

Fossil Ammonite (Orthosphinctes) - Germany #119366

This is a 4.4" fossil ammonite (Orthosphinctes) from Germany. It has bee well prepared and a portion of the rock in which it was fossilized remains attached to form a stand. There are two other ammonites visible in this specimen.

Ammonites were predatory mollusks that resembled a squid with a shell. These cephalopods had eyes, tentacles, and spiral shells. They are more closely related to a living octopus, though the shells resemble that of a nautilus. True ammonites appeared in the fossil record about 240 million years ago. The last lineages disappeared 65 million years ago at the end of the Cretaceous.

What an ammonite would have looked like while alive.

More about ammonites