7" Moroccan Crinoid (Scyphocrinites) Pair - Nice Detail

This is a pair of Silurian aged, Scyphocrinites elegans crinoids from Boutschrafin, Erfoud, Morocco. They have really nice detail and stands out in good relief against the rock. There are several repaired cracks in the rock. The larger specimen is 7" long including the stem and the entire rock is 8.4x7.8"

Crinoids where animals which were rooted to the floor of the ocean by a stem and had many armored feeding arms which they used to filter the water for food. They first appeared in the Ordovician period and are still alive today.

The Scyphocrinites crinoids are quarried around Erfoud, Morocco by digging straight down 16 feet until the layer is reached. Once the crinoid horizon is located a tunnel is dug along it by hand. The rock, dirt and crinoid slabs must then be hauled to the surface in baskets where they are reassembled and prepared. So it is a very labor intensive process to bring a beautiful crinoid plate like this one to market.