from Paleontological Research Institution in Ithaca NY:
Here's another type specimen from the PRI Collections (type specimens and their importance were discussed in last week's Fossil of the Week, August 19, 2009). This one is Heliophyllum halli form pravum Wells, 1937, PRI catalog number 24552. It's a horn coral, from our own Ludlowville Formation (Middle Devonian, Hamilton Group, approx. 380 million years old) at the eastern shore of Skeneateles Lake, Onondaga County, New York. The species was described in volume 2, number 6, of our still-active journal Palaeontographica Americana. This paper described this plus a number of other forms or varieties of the coral Heliophyllum halli, yet emphasized that these are only extreme morphs of a single, highly variable species. Today such forms are often blamed on different ecological conditions that give rise to different shapes, processes, or proportions. This form is characterized by its distorted appearance, perhaps caused when the coral toppled over during a storm, thereafter growing in another direction (notice that the base of the coral grows parallel to the plane of the photograph, whereas the head has turned to face you). "Pravum" is the Latin word for crooked or not straight. PRI honored the author of this species in 2008 by creating the John W. Wells Grants-in-Aid of Research Grant, a competitive scholarship awarded annually to help a graduate student or postdoctoral researcher visit PRI to do collections-based research. John Wells (1907-1994) was a past President of the PRI Board of Trustees, a long-time geology faculty member at Cornell University, and one of the world's leading authorities on fossil and living corals.
