LABORATORY CONTROLLED TAPHONOMIC EXPERIMENT ON CIRRHINUS REBA (REBA CARP) AND LABEO ROHITA (ROHU CARP)

Abstract

Taphonomy is the study of all the processes that occur between the death of an organism and its final state in the rock. So we tried to replicate the environment and study the morphological features by burying organism (fish: Labeo rohita, and Cirrhinus reba of carp family) in different sediments (clay, sand, lime) for different time. For this experiment, a set up was made in which two types of fish (11 in total) of different sizes were buried in different type of sediments, with vegetation or without vegetation, with extra applied load in few cases. And then the buried fish samples were recovered from the sediment in which they were buried to study the possible changes produced. Analysis of T.C.C (total carbon content) was carried out for the recovered samples. The results so obtained suggested that fishes had undergone anaerobic decomposition. We also tried to create a “fossil replica” of provided organism.