Inhabitants of our Oceans Million of years ago, meet the Trilobite…

© Gunther Deichmann - Photo of a fossilized Trilobite from his personal collection.
Inhabitants of our Oceans Million of years ago, meet the Trilobite… they covered the Ocean floor on every continent but went extinct before dinosaurs even came into existence

Trilobites

Trilobites are remarkable, hard-shelled, segmented creatures that existed over 300 million years ago in the Earth's ancient seas. They went extinct before dinosaurs even came into existence, and are one of the key signature creatures of the Paleozoic Era, the first era to exhibit a proliferation of the complex life-forms that established the foundation of life as it is today.
These are amongst the oldest arthropods. They were abundant during the Paleozoic era, but died out at the end of it. They are easy identified with their three part bodies. Typically very ornate and very collectable fossils.

Trilobites appear to have been exclusively marine organisms, since the fossilized remains of trilobites are always found in rocks containing fossils of other salt-water animals such as brachiopods, crinoids, and corals. Within the marine paleoenvironment, trilobites were found in a broad range from extremely shallow water to very deep water. Trilobites, like brachiopods, crinoids, and corals, are found on all modern continents, and occupied every ancient ocean from which Paleozoic fossils have been collected. The remnants of trilobites can range from the preserved body to pieces of the exoskeleton, which it sheds in the process known as ecdysis. In addition, the tracks left behind by trilobites living on the sea floor are often preserved as trace fossils.
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