Dolichoharpes reticulatus Price: Inquire

Dolichoharpes cf. reticulata (specimen #1) Trilobite: length –  30.95mm (1.22”)         Width – 21.77 mm (0.85”) Matrix: length – 89.07 mm (3.50”)       Width – 90.56 mm (3.56”) Mifflin Member, Platteville Formation Grant County, Wisconsin
This specimen is easily within the top 5 best Dolichoharpes reticulata specimens ever found and may be even closer to the top. The specimen was prepared by Gerry Kloc. The field photo, included with the photographic gallery, clearly shows what was missing of the very top of the shield when discovered. This represents the only restoration to the specimen and is easily revealed when backlit (see side photos). The restoration shows as the darker portions of the top of the shield. The epifauna has been left on the specimen and consists of a brachiopod in growth position on the thoracic segment and a tiny crinoid at the anterior edge of the shield. The caramel colored exoskeleton is beautifully contrasted by the buff matrix. This guy is fully inflated and wonderfully extended, ready to crawl off the rock.

The genus Dolichoharpes was not erected until Harry Whittington, while researching the silicified trilobite fauna from the Ordovician Blackriverian Edinburg Limestone of Virginia, recognized that a rare harpid from the Botetourt limestone member represented a new genus. Availability of the Percy Raymond specimens of the Kimmswick Formation Harpid uniserialis allowed comparison to the Edinburg specimens and determination that it also belonged to this new genus though sufficiently different to warrant a new species. Hence in 1949 Whittington published a paper entitled: "Dolichoharpes and the Origin of the Harpid Fringe". Unfortunately, the designated holotype for this new species – reticulata, consists of a fragmented and partial cephalon without a preserved glabella. This has made attribution of other Dolichoharpes specimens to this species difficult. Slowly, complete specimens of this genus are being collected and even more slowly photographs are becoming available for study. Currently there are 7 species that have been placed in the genus. Five occur above the Chatfieldian boundary while two (reticulata and procliva) occur below. Specimens attributed to reticulata have been found in the Edinburg Fm. of Virginia (the holotype); the Platteville Fm. in the upper Mississippi River Valley; the Crown Point Fm. of New York; the Blackriverian Group in Ontario; and the Plattin Fm. of Missouri. Shaw, 1974, attributed the Bromide Fm. species (procliva) to reticulata but recent photographs of complete specimens reveal significant differences between procliva and other attributed reticulata specimens. Until the genus receives its due attention since its establishment 61 years ago, most pre-Chatfieldian Dolichoharpes will likely continue to be attributed to reticulata. Offered here is a rare Dolichoharpes aff. reticulata (carinolobatus) specimen from the Mifflin Mbr. of the Platteville Fm. found in Grant County, Wisconsin. Though DeMott, 1963 described the Mifflin Dolichoharpes as a new species (carinolobatus), the paper was never published. Sloan, et.al, 1987 utilized DeMott’s dissertation, in part, for a review of Platteville trilobites though the decision to attribute this Dolichoharpes to reticulata rather than a new species was made. Rarely are shields of Dolichoharpes found in the Mifflin and the occurrences of complete specimens are extremely uncommon. This is an exceptionally good specimen and would compliment any museum collection or advanced collector. Serious inquiries should be made via e-mail.