Now, that you have established the burrow-nature of your trace fossil, most authors agree on the following hierarchy of importance when it comes to ichnotaxobases (Bertling 2007, Knaust 2012): 1. Orientation, 2. branching, 3. shape, 4. presence or absence of a lining or a mantle, 5. ornamentation (which is regarded as an accessory ichnotaxobase having minor importance at the ichnogenus level). Please, go through the list below and click the appropriate feature of your burrow to bring you one step further:

Orientation
How is the burrow lying in the sediment (look for its dominant orientation)?

• Horizontal to subhorizontal elements are dominant
• Vertical to subvertical elements are dominant
• The burrow is complex. It consist of a number of variables (e.g. vertical, horizontal and perhaps oblique elements are all present and are combined with branchings, spirals, meanders, etc.). The complexity of a trace fossil is based on the number of variables needed to define it and the more variables a burrow has, the more complex it is...