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Man Sized Sea Scorpion Fossil Found
hereisnowhy writes "A giant fossilized claw discovered in Germany belonged to an ancient sea scorpion that was much bigger than the average man, an international team of geologists and archaeologists reported Tuesday. In a report in the Royal Society's journal Biology Letters, the team said the claw indicates that sea scorpion Jaekelopterus rhenania was almost 2.5 meters long, making it the largest arthropod — an animal with a segmented body, jointed limbs and a hard exoskeleton — ever found. In the report, the authors said the scorpion exceeds previous size records for arthropods by almost half a meter."
Man sized sea scorpion? Must be a cousin of the infamous Claw Shrimp
Near-complete specimens of pterygotid eurypterids (which is what this thing is) are already known, and were already known to exceed 2 metres in length. For example, look at this specimen of Pterygotus from a famous locality in New York where eurytperid specimens are mined. So, this isn't some random extrapolation where the remaining anatomy is complete guesswork, it is based on the typical anatomy in the group. Pterygotus and its relatives was freaking huge. While it is true that this specimen could be from a species with an exaggerated claw size compared to other pterygotids, the claws described in the paper are pretty darn big, even for one of these sea scorpions.
While only a claw was found this time, I'd like to point out that this is not the first very large Eurypterid to be found. A complete Eurypterid was found, that is a few meters in length, at Lang's Quarry near Herkimer, NY. (Eurypterid fossils are commonly found there, and in many locations across Upstate NY and Ontario, Canada). A cast is on display at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, Ontario Canada for the public to see. I don't recall the exact length, but it's taller than I am (at 5'11"). Most Eurypterids are pretty small. I have a collection of complete Eurypterid specimens but none of mine are more than 12" in length.