Latest news with #Bennicke
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Fish's Unwanted 66-Million-Year-Old Meal Lands in a Museum
Museums tend to show off the remnants of animal meals in the form of owl pellets or coprolites, but fish snacks—especially 66-million-year-old ones—are another story. A rare find from eastern Denmark depicts the immaculately fossilized remains of an ancient fish's meal, which it partially chewed and spat back out. The fossil is now on display at a Danish museum. Amateur fossil hunter Peter Bennicke found the rejected meal at Stevns Klint, a coastal cliff and UNESCO world heritage site known for its geological and archaeological treasures. Perfectly preserved in a block of chalk he'd split were a "strange little collection of sea lily pieces." Intrigued, Bennicke brought the fossil to Geomuseum Faxe, a natural history museum and research institution, for inspection. Paleontologist John Jagt determined that the sea lily remnants were once a fish's meal. Sea lilies, known formally as crinoids, are marine invertebrates that look much like the flower-bearing plants we see on land. They've become snacks for fish and fellow echinoderms for hundreds of millions of years—as far back as the Cambrian period—despite a protective mucous coating that makes them toxic to some predators. Credit: Sten Lennart Jakobsen This particular bunch of sea lilies had likely been munched by a hungry predator some 66 million years before Bennicke's chalky discovery. The fact that the sea lilies were in pieces suggested that this fish had chewed its snack before rejecting it. Still, the fossil wasn't technically vomit. Based on the integrity the individual pieces had managed to keep, the sea lilies never made it to the fish's digestive tract, and were instead spat out quickly after chewing. As the fish moved on, its unwanted food likely became lodged in marine sediment, where it fossilized over tens of millions of years. "It's really an unusual find," said Geomuseum Faxe curator Jesper Milàn in a translated statement. "Søliljer (sea lilies) are not a particularly nutrient-rich diet, as they mainly consist of limeplates that are held together by a few soft parts. But here is an animal, probably a kind of fish that 66 million years ago ate Søliljer, who lived on the bottom of the Cretaceous sea. Such a find provides important new knowledge about the relationship between predators and prey and the food chains in the Cretaceous seas."
CNN
29-01-2025
- Science
- CNN
66-million-year-old animal vomit discovered in Denmark
An amateur fossil hunter has uncovered a piece of animal vomit dating back 66 million years on a beach in Denmark. Peter Bennicke noticed a 'strange small cluster of lily pieces in a piece of chalk' at Stevns Klint in eastern Denmark, according to a statement from Geomuseum Faxe, a local museum where the find will be displayed, sent to CNN on Wednesday. Bennicke brought the fossil to the museum, where it was cleaned and examined by John Jagt, a lily expert from the Netherlands. Jagt said the cluster contains at least two species of lily combined in a round lump, which is likely the indigestible parts of the lilies that were regurgitated by an animal that ate the plants. 'In technical terms, this type of find is called regurgitalite, and they are considered very important when reconstructing ancient ecosystems because they provide valuable information about which animals were eaten by whom,' reads the statement. Jesper Milàn, curator at Geomuseum Faxe, said the fossil 'is truly an extraordinary find.' 'Lilies are not a particularly nutritious food, as they are mainly made up of calcium plates held together by very few soft tissues,' he said in the statement. 'But here we have an animal, most likely some kind of fish, that 66 million years ago ate lilies that lived on the seabed of the Cretaceous Sea and then vomited up the skeletal parts.' Milàn added that the discovery 'provides important new knowledge about the relationship between predators and prey and the food chains of the Cretaceous seas.'
Yahoo
29-01-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Amateur fossil hunter finds 66-million-year-old animal vomit
Sign up for CNN's Wonder Theory science newsletter. Explore the universe with news on fascinating discoveries, scientific advancements and more. An amateur fossil hunter has uncovered a piece of animal vomit dating back 66 million years on a beach in Denmark. Peter Bennicke noticed a 'strange small cluster of lily pieces in a piece of chalk' at Stevns Klint in eastern Denmark, according to a statement from Geomuseum Faxe, a local museum where the find will be displayed, sent to CNN on Wednesday. Bennicke brought the fossil to the museum, where it was cleaned and examined by John Jagt, a lily expert from the Netherlands. Jagt said the cluster contains at least two species of lily combined in a round lump, which is likely the indigestible parts of the lilies that were regurgitated by an animal that ate the plants. 'In technical terms, this type of find is called regurgitalite, and they are considered very important when reconstructing ancient ecosystems because they provide valuable information about which animals were eaten by whom,' reads the statement. Jesper Milàn, curator at Geomuseum Faxe, said the fossil 'is truly an extraordinary find.' 'Lilies are not a particularly nutritious food, as they are mainly made up of calcium plates held together by very few soft tissues,' he said in the statement. 'But here we have an animal, most likely some kind of fish, that 66 million years ago ate lilies that lived on the seabed of the Cretaceous Sea and then vomited up the skeletal parts.' Milàn added that the discovery 'provides important new knowledge about the relationship between predators and prey and the food chains of the Cretaceous seas.'
CNN
29-01-2025
- Science
- CNN
66-million-year-old animal vomit discovered in Denmark
An amateur fossil hunter has uncovered a piece of animal vomit dating back 66 million years on a beach in Denmark. Peter Bennicke noticed a 'strange small cluster of lily pieces in a piece of chalk' at Stevns Klint in eastern Denmark, according to a statement from Geomuseum Faxe, a local museum where the find will be displayed, sent to CNN on Wednesday. Bennicke brought the fossil to the museum, where it was cleaned and examined by John Jagt, a lily expert from the Netherlands. Jagt said the cluster contains at least two species of lily combined in a round lump, which is likely the indigestible parts of the lilies that were regurgitated by an animal that ate the plants. 'In technical terms, this type of find is called regurgitalite, and they are considered very important when reconstructing ancient ecosystems because they provide valuable information about which animals were eaten by whom,' reads the statement. Jesper Milàn, curator at Geomuseum Faxe, said the fossil 'is truly an extraordinary find.' 'Lilies are not a particularly nutritious food, as they are mainly made up of calcium plates held together by very few soft tissues,' he said in the statement. 'But here we have an animal, most likely some kind of fish, that 66 million years ago ate lilies that lived on the seabed of the Cretaceous Sea and then vomited up the skeletal parts.' Milàn added that the discovery 'provides important new knowledge about the relationship between predators and prey and the food chains of the Cretaceous seas.'
Yahoo
29-01-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
66 million-year-old fish vomit from time of the dinosaurs found in Denmark
Scientists have discovered what might be the 'world's most famous piece of puke ever' after a piece of fossilised vomit dating back to the age of the dinosaurs was discovered in Denmark. The find was made by local fossil hunter Peter Bennicke at Stevns Klint, a UNESCO-listed coastal cliff in the east of the country, south of Copenhagen. While out on a walk, Mr Bennicke, came across some unusual-looking fragments which turned out to be pieces of sea lily - an underwater species related to starfish and sea urchins - in a piece of chalk. When he took the fragments to be examined at the Museum of East Zealand, they confirmed the vomit could be dated to the end of the Cretaceous period, 66 million years ago. The fragments of vomit would have been emitted when dinosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus Rex and Triceratops were still roaming. Palaeontologist and curator at the Museum of East Zealand, Jesper Milàn, told the BBC the fossil was a 'truly an unusual find' as it forms a piece in the puzzle of understanding relationships in the prehistoric food chain. He told the broadcaster: 'It tells us something about who was eating who 66 million years ago.' The palaeontologist explained that sea lilies were not a particularly nutritious diet, as they mainly consisted of chalky skeletal plates, held together by a few soft parts. During the period, fish and sharks would eat them despite the fact they were hard to digest, meaning they would 'regurgitate all the chalk bits.' The discovery, also gives an insight into past ecosystems, as Mr Milàn continued: 'This find is a unique glimpse into the everyday situation in the bottom of the Cretaceous sea - the sea during which the dinosaurs lived.' The Museum of East Zealand only sent word of the discovery out to local press before it got picked up globally, making it 'the world's most famous piece of puke ever.'
