Sclerites and possible mouthparts of Wiwaxia from the temperate palaeolatitudes of Colombia, South America

Abstract

The problematic mollusc Wiwaxia is perhaps the most widely distributed non-mineralized Cambrian metazoan, but has only been reported from palaeotropical latitudes. Here, we describe mid-Cambrian (Drumian, c. 504 Ma) sclerites and possible tooth arrays from the northern Llanos Basin, Colombia, recovered from drilled ditch cuttings by palynological processing – demonstrating that pristine material and low-manipulation processing are not essential to the recovery of Small Carbonaceous Fossils. This, the first report of Wiwaxia from South America, substantially expands Wiwaxia's geographic range into the high palaeolatitudes.