Talpina Hagenow, 1840

Macroboring; substrate calcareous; tracemaker invertebrate?

Several different groups of organisms such as sponges, annelids, various other "worms", bryozoans, or "protists" have been supposed to be the producers of Talpina borings (e. g. Voigt, 1972, 1975) . The overall shape of Talpina borings shows features typical for organisms that live in colonies. Voigt ( 1972, 1975) showed that Talpina borings very closely resemble the borings of pseudocolonies of the Recent phoronid Phoronis ovalis Wright, 1856 in molluscan shells, and that the ichnogenus Talpina, therefore, with great certainty represents borings produced by pseudocolonial phoronids.

Diagnosis, emended herein: Narrow, tubular borings in hard substrat es with overall morphology changing astogenetically from short, simple borings to extensive, multibranching tunnel systems with numerous apertures towards exterior (borings of pseudocolonies); completely buried in the substrate. Tunnels with circular to oval crosssection, straight to strongly curved; short side branches towards apertures oft en developed near branching points of the main tunnel system.

Category of architectural design: 2.68. Branched tubular borings.

Branched, network.

Remark: Narrow curved, branching tunnels connected to the surface by apertures. Attributed to colonial species of phoronid worms.