Burgess Shale
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The Burgess Shale is a fossil-bearing deposit exposed in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia, Canada. It is famous for the exceptional preservation of the soft parts of its fossils. At c.505 mill
Ottoia, a soft-bodied worm, abundant in the Burgess Shale. (From Smith et al. 2015)
Satellite image of the area.
Walcott Quarry of the Burgess Shale showing the Walcott Quarry Shale Member. The white parallel vertical streaks are remnants of drill holes made during excavations in the mid-1990s.
Restoration of the benthic environment of the site, showing Canadaspis perfecta gathering to mate and moult in the Walcott Quarry of the Burgess Shale (Phyllopod Bed, Layer -350), alongside other benthic animals like Wiwaxia, and the arthropod Marrella swimming above.
Pikaia
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Pikaia gracilens is an extinct, primitive chordate marine animal known from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale of British Columbia. Described in 1911 by Charles Doolittle Walcott as an annelid, and in
Fossil of Pikaia gracilens (Syntype USNM PAL 57628)
Plate 20 of Walcott Cambrian Geology and Paleontology II (1911), by Charles Doolittle Walcott, showing fossils of Pikaia and Oesia