PALEOECOLOGY OF OSTRACODS FROM THE HOMININ SITES AND PALEOLAKES DRILLING PROJECT’S WEST TURKANA KAITIO CORE FROM WEST TURKANA, KENYA

Eastern Africa is ripe with early hominin fossils and West Turkana has one of the most famous fossils in existence, Turkana Boy. Turkana Boy perished at a lake margin which helped to preserve his bones. Because hominins are terrestrial, fossils similar to Turkana Boy are not found very often and, in fact, the depositional area of the lake margin supported fossilization. Ostracods, a commonly found bivalve-like crustacean, from the core are contemporaries to this hominin and due to the abundance of these creatures in the core, it is possible to use them as a part of the puzzle for finding evidence of environmental conditions. This poster focuses on the paleoecology of ostracods from the WTK13 core from the Hominin Sites and Paleolakes Drilling Project, HSPDP, taken from West Turkana, Kenya, next to Lake Turkana. Paleontological and isotopic studies performed on the ostracods from the core in addition to geological findings and current knowledge of geologic outcrops will help to find paleoecological data.