Gogonasus
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Gogonasus Temporal range: Late Devonian |
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| life restoration of Gogonasus andrewsae | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Subphylum: | Vertebrata |
| Class: | Sarcopterygii |
| Infraclass: | Tetrapodomorpha |
| Superorder: | ?Osteolepidida |
| Order: | ?Osteolepiformes |
| Family: | ?Osteolepidae |
| Genus: |
Gogonasus Long, 1985 |
| Species: | G. andrewsae |
| Binomial name | |
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Gogonasus andrewsae Long, 1985 |
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Gogonasus (meaning "snout from Gogo") was a lobe-finned fish known from 3-dimensionally preserved 380 million-year-old fossils found from the Gogo Formation in Western Australia. It lived in the late Devonian period, on what was once a 1400 kilometre coral reef off the Kimberley coast surrounding the north-west of Australia. Gogonasus was a small fish reaching 30-40 cm (1 ft) in length.
Its skeleton shows several features that were like those of a four-legged land animal (tetrapod). They included the structure of its middle ear, and its fins show the precursors of the forearm bones, the radius and ulna. Researchers believe it used its forearm-like fins to dart out of the reef to catch prey.
Gogonasus was first described from a single snout (ethmosphenoid) by John A. Long (1985). On Long's 1986 expedition to Gogo the first relatively complete skull of Gogonasus was found by Chris Nelson and after being prepared solved a scientific controversy by showing that the inner large fangs of the coronoid bones did not insert into the choana of the palate (Long 1988) as had been suggested by Rosen et al. (1981) for Eusthenopteron. In 1990 a combined expedition from the Western Australian Museum and the Australian National University yielded another almost complete skull of Gogonasus, this one found by Dr R.E. Barwick. The full description of its cranial anatomy appeared in Long, J. A., Barwick, R. E. & Campbell, K.S.W. (1997), although not all aspects of the skull were clear then even from the 3 specimens. In 2005 Long lead another expedition back to Gogo and on July 11 one of the team members, Dr Tim Senden from the Australian National University, found a very well preserved skeleton of Gogonasus, containing almost the complete fish down to the tip of the tail. It was Dr Senden's first field trip with the other researchers.
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