This week I am at the American Geophysical Union meeting, so I have access to lots of fossils! This fossil is from the Lower Cretaceous (about 125 million years ago) and was found in what is now Brazil. It is a perfect sample for my favorite game of “animal, vegetable, mineral”—we already know it is a mineral now, but was it once an animal or a vegetable (as in a plant)? Does it help if I tell you that you can find something very similar today?
I think it looks a little like a maple seed pod, but is it? You tell me!
