10.2" Fossil Clam (Inocerasmus) Shell - Smoky Hill Chalk, Kansas

Fossil Clam (Inocerasmus) Shell - Smoky Hill Chalk, Kansas #197344

This is one half of a giant clam (Inocerasmus) shell from the Smoky Hill Chalk, Gove County, Kansas. The shell has very nice preservation and provides an excellent glimpse of the massive size these bivalves could attain. The outer shell is encrusted in small oyster shells and other small marine fossils.

Inocerasmus was very large marine bivalve distantly resembling modern pearl oysters of the genus Pteria. They had heavy shell with calcite crystals imbedded in them. Occasionally, these clams are found with pearls though this is not a guarantee because of the relative instability of aragonite, which the pearl is composed of. There is some confusion regarding labeling Inoceramids as clams or oysters, but they are in fact more clam-like than oyster-like.

It comes with an acrylic display stand.

The Smoky Hill Chalk Member of the Niobrara Chalk formation is a Cretaceous conservation Lagerstätte, or fossil-rich geological formation, known primarily for its exceptionally well-preserved marine reptiles. It outcrops in parts of northwest Kansas--its most famous localities for fossils--and in southeastern Nebraska. Large, well-known fossils excavated from the Smoky Hill Chalk include marine reptiles such as plesiosaurs, large bony fish such as Xiphactinus, mosasaurs, pterosaurs, and turtles.