The Earth Sciences Museum at the University of Waterloo recently purchased a reconstruction of a Cambrian predator from the Burgess Shale in British Columbia. Research continues into these interesting creatures by such experts as Dr. Desmond Collins of the Royal Ontario Museum. Our museum has a reconstruction of Burgess Shale times purchased over ten years ago when similar dioramas were produced for the Smithsonian and other museums. One thing our display and others lacked was an Anomalocaris. With the help of Alumni Funds it was possible to purchase an 80 cm Anomalocaris for our display. The new reconstruction was scheduled for delivery in March. On calling the company to ask why the delivery was delayed they said that it had to be rebuilt because Desmond Collins had just published a new reconstruction of Anomalocaris in the Paleontological Journal. The reconstruction was scrapped and a new one was made using the new information as illustrated on the next page. The photograph above is a composite consisting of a photograph of the new model overlaid on a photograph to simulate the environment in which it lived.
Anomalocaris reconstruction has evolved from a very simple shrimp-like form to the complex creature seen today as better and more complete specimens became available from Canada and China. Much of Desmond Collins' recent studies have been funded by the National Geographic Society.
References
The "Evolution," of Anomalocaris and its classification in the Arthropod class Dinocarida (Nov.) and order Radiodonta (Nov.), Journal of Paleontology, V. 70, No. 2, 1996.
Wonderful Life, The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History, W.W. Norton & Company, 1989.