hezekiah jones

Well, that's at least the understatement of the month.

Coragyps

From the quiz:
I keep trying to warn you hellbound pinko infidel turdbiscuits about the dangers of the wily and ferocious Jurassic carrot, but will you listen???

lpetrich

That's "Archaeocyathid" -- a kind of coral that lived during the Cambrian but that went extinct at the end of that period. What they are most closely related to is unknown.

MrDarwin

I'm coming in awfully late on this, but I'd like to point out that one major reason why submerged wood lasts so long is because terrestrial insects (termites, ants, beetle larvae, etc.) and other invertebrates, as well as bacteria, that specialize in eating wood simply can't get at it under water. There are few aquatic organisms that specialize in eating wood, probably because it's not a common commodity underwater (as opposed to a forest floor).

(Tidbit on corpse decomposition: the fastest way to decompose a corpse is to leave it exposed where maggots and other creepy crawlies can eat it; many murderers bury their victims, which ironically makes the body last considerably longer because the flies can't find it.) (I used to be a librarian and a book on forensic entomology came across my desk once...)