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Curious as to what I have found. Approx 12” across. (30 CM)

Picked up two large items the other day. I figure they are large ammonites but the disks toward the bottom on the cleaned up one are confusing. They would be bilateral equal except for the break in the one. The second is about 125lbs and has an dark orange/blk pattern showing thru in areas that appear to be shell. Neylandville Formation, Hunt County TX

Hi all, I am finally getting ready to proceed with stabilizing the specimens I found in this trip: They are basically big sandstone steinkerns, now fully dry. They were found in ferrous sandstone concretions surrounded by sand. The matrix is soft , pieces can be broken off with fingers. I was advised to brush ammos with a PVA solution, but then I thought what if I use Paraloid instead? So the questions are as follows: 0. Is it worth it? 1. If so, what solution should I use? 2%? 5% or more? 2. How much will be required? (the biggest ammo is about 40 cm in diameter and 15 cm thick, 20+kg) 3. How and how many times to apply? With a brush? Once a day for several days in a row (as with PVA) or otherwise? 4. Do I need to cover the surface with a stronger solution afterwards? Thanks in advance! The matrix:

In the few trips made to Trinity river in Tarrant county I've spotted several peices of these large whorls, I'm wondering if these are from Mariella ammonites or a heteromorph? I have found some pretty big Mariellas in Grayson marl but nothing close to this size. Is that maybe where they originate?, is the Trinity cutting through that formation? I'd love to figure that out and try to find a more complete one.

Any idea which species this is? The ammonite is from Madagascar, but I don't have the exact location. Size 26 inches, weight 120 kgs

Hi friends, I went to Aruma formation area (Campanian-Maastrichrtian) to the North of Riyadh city and found this small fossil , 26mm long by22mm What could it be?

Here's the reconstruction of Koenenites I promised. Koenenites was a Devonian ammonoid with a very compressed shell and sharp keel. It was designed for fast swimming and thanks to the shape of its suture, it could accelerate very quickly compared to the ammonoids around it without its cameral fluid sloshing around and shifting its center of gravity. Because of its evolute shell, it likely had a large hyponome, which goes with the shape of its shell. After looking at some pictures of Koenenites fossils from Michigan that may have preserved the Supercephalic Attachment Area, I arrived at the proto-hood size in the picture. The eye size was inspired by the "ammonite preserved out of its shell", which preserved what is likely the ammonite's eye-cups, though eye size varies greatly. I based the hooks off of those of the much later ammonites, so Koenenites may have had ones different form those shown here. These preserved hooks were in positions similar to those on today's squid's tentacles, so ammonoids likely had elongated tentacles. The 8 thin, retractable arms were inspired by fossils of Baculites ammonites, though Koenenites was an active pursuit predator and Baculites a planktivore. Koenenites could afford smaller arms, though, because it likely had two muscular tentacles. I reconstructed this ammonoid's shell with a monochromatic color pattern, because nektobenthic ammonites have been found with this. Shell orientation based on preserved Supercephalic Attachment Areas. The second picture shows how Koenenites' (3A, 3B) suture shape helped it accelerate faster without its cameral fluid sloshing than other ammonoids like Agoniatites (1A, 1B) and Tornoceras (2A, 2B). bottom shows what would happen when the ammonoids started cruising at a slow to moderate pace, top shows what would happen when they tried to accelerate quickly. The lobe of the next suture would break the wave of cameral fluid so that its entire weight would not all hit the venter, but only a little bit. This shows that while Koenenites and Tornoceras were comfortable accelerating quickly, Agoniatites was more stable at cruising at an even speed. Any suggestions would be helpful! If there are any papers about ammonoid (or more specifically ammonite) soft tissue, that would be helpful too.

I found a few days ago this fragment of ammonite, (Cretaceous). I was wondering if any of you might recognize her.

I’m not sure what this is. This little croissant shaped guy struck me as interesting as I was hunting through a pile of limestone in our new construction neighborhood in northern Bexar County, Texas. It’s in northern San Antonio. I thought it might be a shell of some sort. It’s about 4.5 to 5 inches wide and about 1.5 inches in depth. It has striations here and there and a shape that looks like a nautilus, but may just be an interesting concrete on or piece of limestone. Anyone got any ideas or answers? The ‘center’ of the ‘croissant’ has a grayish area that’s really different from the rest of it. Thanks for any ideas!!!

Hello, Does this association of Didymoceras cheyennense and Baculites compressus seem legitimate? Any restoration/reconstruction going on, or composite of multiple individuals, especially on the Didymoceras? Dimensions are 22cm x 14cm x 14cm, and listed as of Lower Cretaceous age and from the Pierre Shale of South Dakota. Also, if you had to pick one heteromorph ammonite specimen, would you personally purchase this for your collection (i.e. is it a good example of Didymoceras cheyennense)? I realize this is just a part of the inner whorls. Complete Didymoceras in general seem to be very rare and exorbitantly expensive so perhaps this is a good enough piece? I don't exactly have a fortune to spend, but I can justify one big purchase as a gift to myself. Thanks.

Has anyone got any advice on drawing ammonites accurately? It is often the ribs which identify an ammonite, so they are very important to get right and while I my observational skills are fairly good, I find it hard to believe people like Ernst Haeckle relied purely on observation. I don't strive for Haeckle's realism as I draw in a more sketchy manner, but I do strive for accuracy all the same. Is there a sort of formula to plot ammonite ribs? Thanks!

On our last fieldtrip to France this weekend we found a chalk-boulder with a quite large ammonite in it. The chalk was realy hard, but I was able to reduce it in size to take it back home. At the start of the prep with chislle and hammer I got a lucky split where the boulder opened to reveal most of the ammonite. The airscribe then did a quick job to remove the last bits. Sadly the center of the ammonite wasn't preserved, I tried to sculpt the center as well as I could and coloured it to match the fossil. As for the determination we had a little doubt between Cunningtoniceras inerme and Acanthoceras rothomagense as both species can look a lot alike and this specimen was slightly deformed in the chalk whitch made determination a bit harder, but most of the sings point towards A. rhotomagense .( the whorls here being higher than wide ) As found: the end result: A. rhotomagense mid. Cenomanian Cap-Blanc-Nez ( France )

Hi everyone, I went fossil hunting on the Yorkshire Coast a few days ago and picked up plenty of Dactylioceras ammos but not much else. Among them are these two which both cracked after an exploratory 'tap' with the hammer. I have never glued broken ammonites together for prep before but have seen it spoken about a lot. I have a few questions about how to approach this. Firstly, do you think these specimens are viable? The other issue is that I only have a Dremel to prep with so even if I glue them back together there will be an awful lot of matrix to remove.. Where do you apply the glue? On the whole surface of the broken fragment including the matrix, or just the fossil? Is there anything to look out for when prepping a glued ammonite? Which side of the ammonite should I prep from once glued? For the smaller ammonite, most of the specimen is on the smaller half of the rock, so obviously I would rather prep from that side in, but would going from the other side be preferable? I'm not sure I've made much sense here so please tell me if I've just spouted some nonsense! Ammo 1 Ammo 2

Hey y'all, here's an ammonite I found in what I'm fairly sure is a small, unmapped Eagle Ford outcrop. I'm hoping to use it as an index fossil, as the target species that I'm hoping this outcrop will produce occurs in the late cenomanian/early turonian Bouldin Flags member of the Eagle Ford formation. I find that the written descriptions that I've read about the bouldin flags geology are inadequate for my understanding, as it seems colors, shades, and degree of textures are up to the interpretation of the reader. Maybe I'm just overthinking that though. Hopefully this ammo helps. @LSCHNELLE, I know you're familiar with the Bouldin Flags - seem familiar? (Diameter=1 inch)

Hello, I had a question about the coloration of the beautiful South Dakota ammonites from the Fox Hills formation/Pierre Shale. Namely, many Hoploscaphites/Discoscaphites ammonites have a milky white nacre of the shell, whereas others seem to have a vibrant red/brown sheen. For example here are two photos of Hoploscaphites nicoletti I found demonstrating the two types of colorations: I was wondering what causes the difference in this coloration, and whether one is more rare/valuable than the other? I want a nice South Dakota ammonite for my collection and I'm contemplating options. Thanks!

I purchased several of these inexpensively as giveaways for children. The dealer was somewhat clueless as to the origin. I don't normally buy fossils but I assume they are commonly offered for sale since they were so cheap. Does anyone recognize where these are from and any other bits of information? They seem relatively heavy, almost like hematite replacement. Picture of a representative example:

Sorry for a lot of posts recently Cleaning house and have found some in storage Here are all the ones that were found. Any that can be identified + age, and are any fakes? I'm suspicious of the black trilobite I can retake photos if needed, any information would help

Hi all - I am trying to find out the type of ammonite I have here and any other helpful information like age and where it's from. ammonitepics.zip

Hi all. I found this piece today in Withernsea, Yorkshire. I have a Dremel and I've made a start on prepping it but I'm scared of damaging hidden ammonites. Any suggestions? Also, what type of ammonites are they? Thanks for any advice.

Alright folks, just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of our fateful trip... but if your in a TLDR mood.... Fossils get real heavy, real fast, and we found a lot. I had a rare full weekend off work, so my son and I went back to hunt the lake Texoma shoreline for a 2 day exploration. We started off in the same beach we found last time (that I dubbed "Echinoid Beach"), but construction had changed everything and made it much harder to hunt. The worst part is that last time we left a small pile when moving everything back to the truck. I knew where it was, but when we arrived, I realized that its buried and probably gone forever. But we made the best of it and hunted what we could. We wound up finding a lot more echinoids and one huge partial mortoniceras ammonite, plus it has echinoids in the matrix with it, so I couldnt hack that off in the field to save weight (it was HEAVY). Oh, that little one on the bottom left... I have hopes its a nautilus! Will have to prep it out to see what all is there. We had originally planned to camp out overnight, but a strong north front had pushed in overnight before, so it was 20 mph winds and lows in the 20s. So, instead we went into the town of Durant and got a hotel room. The next morning the temps were again in the 20s, frost covering the truck, but at least the winds were mild (but not absent) so we decided to check out "ammonite beach" close to the spillway. I have seen a lot of reports and pics from there, so I had an idea of the details, but this was our first trip there. Let me just say.... be careful what you wish for! I had seen pics of giant ammonites. I wanted to find a giant, complete ammonite. I wasnt mentally prepared to recover a giant, complete ammonite! We started out hunt right at the boat ramp, following the shoreline all the way around. Actually found several small partials right away, so I had high hopes. We continued on. Lots of large gryphaea in areas, and isolated areas with lot of ammonite molds and partials, so we spent a lot of time examining everything, but not finding much beyond the oysters. Finally, (I think it was over an hour later) we got to the holy shrine of the ammonite. The sights were just as the legends fortold. Ammos everywhere! Molds and partials every step you took. Some of the partials were massive as well. We looked carefully, hoping for something missed by the throngs of previous searchers, with little luck. Mr. George and his sister had passed us waaaaay back towards the start, and they were ahead in the next cove, and working on something too. They obviously knew more than us, so me made out way that direction. We did find a couple of very nice partials (halves) from the cliffside as we went, so we stashed those and moved one. Then we got to the blocks. That is where George was hammering away to chisel a monster free of the rock. Wonderful fellow, and it turns out I follow him on Youtube (North Texas Fossil Dude). He showed us what and where and how, and we moved down the beach hunting for our own monster, and we found one. Buried in stone, only the top showing. Was it complete? Could we get it out? was it excessively buried under the big caprock above? We decided to give it a go. We hammered, and hammered, and hammered on the chisels. Our arms ached but we were making progress. We kept working until finally we could see a separation develop under the bottom edge. Carefully we pried and lifted and it came free! YAY!!!! We had out ammonite! But now we had to get it back to the truck. It a LOOOOONG walk with 75??? pounds of fossils each (I had all the partials and my son had the big boy) plus hammers, chisels, picks, camera, etc. My rough measurement looks like about 1-1/2 miles long the shoreline. It felt like about 3. George and his sister were kind enough to leave us a 3rd ammonite and a half dozen tiny echinoids they recovered from their spot. The ammo wasnt tiny either! It measures 11 1/2" across! We had originally planned to go creek scouting for our next trip, but we were absolutely spent getting everything back. I helped the local economy by having a great lunch in Dennison at burger shack a block off the highway called "Best Burger Barn". If you go, get the pretzel and cheese appetizer. Seriously the best pretzel I have every had.