Coprolite!

Here are a couple of different coprolites that were found on Shanklin Beach this year. The actual find location was down past the pub below Shanklin Chine and they were located among the pebbles between low and high tide marks.

I don't know much  about coprolites other than that they are fossilised excrement and given that these were found in an area of Cretaceous rocks, it is possible that they are  dinosaur excrement.

The first of these is greyish and has he twisted convolutions that I understand are familiar to meat eating creatures. There are bits of things  in among it that could be small bones or teeth or even feathers.

 

The second is in a brownish matrix, is a more regular 'stone' shape and appears to contain lots of little bits and pieces of black matter that could also be bones. Other shapes are clearly bits of shells and there is one particular area where the serrated edge of a shell is visible.

Not that I am any expert is these matters but my assessment would be that the grey twisty one was deposited on land and came from a small meat or fish eating creature that lived on land.



The other, I would hazard a guess,  was deposited in the sea or a lagoon by a marine predator feeding on fish and shellfish.

One particular observation that I would make about the darker coprolite is that it has definite flat surfaces which appear consistent with something viscous sitting on a hard surface without the appearance of shear or other slicing. The image below shows some examples of this.

I wonder if there is any formula or rule that can be used to determine the size of the creature that dropped this from the diameter of the coprolite which on this one appears to be around 1.8 to 2.0 cms.

There, who would have  thought that shit could be  so interesting but then I guess you are what you eat!