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Dear Guys, I noticed many different forms of Lungfish dental plates in my collection, especially from Late Famennian dolomites from the Zagare quarry. Please help to identify genera of these teeth, if you cannot do it then please help to find a specialist on this type and age of remains if you could. Best Regards Domas

Last weekend was a fieldtrip to my usual spot the late Devonian in the area of Chimay in Belgium. And of course hunting for the prized cephalopods. Althoug the usual deposits are depleted due to the activity in the quarry, there are now new deposits that can be prospected. A lot of Matagne formation is now exposed, here a lot of small but wel presereved fossils can be found , mainly brachiopods, but in the correct layer and with a little patience a few pyritized cephalopods can be discovered, mainly: Bactrites sp. , multiple kinds of Gephuroceratina ( Manticoceras..) and Tornoceras. The day was cold, rainy and even a few snowflakes, but it was wel worth the trouble. Thx to Anthonie Hellemond (President Belgian Paleontological Association 2018) for the pictures in the field ( and the extra goniatites ) Bactrites: Manticoceras on bottom and a little Tornoceras on top. Oh and in contrast to all the little pyritised fellows there was this one ( also credits to Anthonie for the discovery ) It wil take a while to prep .... Cheers, Manticocerasman

Today I went to the "Belgian institute of natural history" to donate my placoderm that I found in Oktober. It is verry likely that it is a new species , but only time will tel. The local placoderm specialist wil work on this specimen for the description. Here is the link to te 1st thread on this topic:

A few months back I managed to get a whole piece of one of the layers that delivered cephalopods. I took the whole rock back home spotting only a few posible cephalopods. After the prep work this is how it looked in the beginning: multiple Goniatites and orthocones on 1 plate: ( Manticoceras, Sphearomanticoceras, Orthoceras ) Late Devonian ( Frasnian ) Chimay area ( Belgium) after a little work:

Fossils from the world's oldest trees reveal complex anatomy never seen before. Intricate web of woody strands inside 374-million-year-old tree trunks point to most complicated trees to have ever grown on Earth, Cardiff University, October 23, 2017 http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/news/view/981090-worlds-oldest-and-most-complex-trees https://www.livescience.com/60746-earth-oldest-trees-had-complex-structure.html https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/10/171023182615.htm https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-10/caos-rpe102317.php Hong-He Xu, Christopher M. Berry, William E. Stein, Yi Wang, Peng Tang, Qiang Fu. Unique growth strategy in the Earth’s first trees revealed in silicified fossil trunks from China. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2017; 201708241 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1708241114 http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2017/10/18/1708241114 Yours, Paul H.

I promised some regular posts from my collection in the weeks to come, so for this week I got two particular goniatites I like to share. Both specimens are weathered, but reveal some beautiful crystalisation of the chambers. Especialy the large one where they even form small calcite geodes. 1st specimen: Manticoceras sp. Frasnian Chimay area ( Belgium ) 2nd specimen: Sphaeromanticoceras sp. Frasnian Chimay area ( Belgium )

Last weekend I had again a field trip to my favorite location in the area of Couvin. We went to the quarry with a geology club, around 20 participants came to the meeting point. Everyone got a quick briefing of the geology and paleontology of the quarry and the usual safety instructions before going down in the quarry. Once at the interesting spot we noted a few changes: a pile of gray nodular limestone was freshly excavated. In those boulders a few of us found large well preserved goniatites. I had the chance to find a nice one from around 8cm in diameter. After a careful examination of the boulder I went on top of the quarry to dig out a layer yielding small cephalopods ( orthoceras, manticoceras and bactrites ) I had to dig whit a heavy pickaxe, but I was able to clear a decent part of that layer for me and a couple of the other searchers. The hard work paid off, I found around 20 goniatites and a whole bunch of orthocones, most of them are waiting for a cleanup and prepwork. While leaving the quarry I saw a piece of shell sticking out of a stone, a lucky split of that rock turned out to reveal a large Goniatite with beautiful suture lines. This one will require some extra prepwork, but it looks very promising.

It has been a while since I made a decent post on this forum ( spending most of my time here in the chatroom ) But last weekend I took the courage to prep some of my recent and older finds. In my older posts you could notice that I’m particularly interested in the Paleozoic fossils of my small country, especially if I can get some cephalopods. Although they are relatively rare here, we found a few deposits wielding them, and in the quarry of Lompret a specific layer has been really productive for them. Their conservation isn’t always very good and they might be hard to spot, but this I a selection that I made and prepped. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do. https://goo.gl/photos/s1N12Vic27d49GUb9 This one had a little surprise during the prep, while clearing the goniatite I discovered a small orthocone under it. ( Manticoceras sp + orthocone: might be orthoceras or Bactrites ) https://goo.gl/photos/Ek4BYCRckhLBxNWP7 Manticoceras sp. https://goo.gl/photos/hw1LotmNF4KzxCyp6 Multiple orthocones, the largest one judging by the position of the siphuncle should be an Orthoceras sp. https://goo.gl/photos/thc9WLxVT6zWgrTC8 Manticoceras sp. https://goo.gl/photos/bS4EniPSXf1miQVEA This is one of my favorites: a double Manticoceras sp. https://goo.gl/photos/exfdSJ2X1XzFtMy78 https://goo.gl/photos/oFvCtRKuWauJtKwL8 This is probably the best one in my colection: 3 complete Manticoceras and a partial one and a Orthocone. ( that last wan came loose during the prep and was glued back in position. ) I realy like the tiny specimen in the chamber of the larger one Cheers, Kevin

Yet another fieldtrip to the late Devonian (Belgium) Last Saturday I organized with my pall Anthonie, a field trip for our Paleontology club. The location was the quarry in Lompret, here they exploit the hard limestone from the ancient Devonian reef ( Frasnian deposits ) On the top and sides of this reef we find softer deposits from the lagoons around it. The trip to the quarry rainy, as usual from the past few weeks, but et the location the clouds were clearing up. We waited for the whole group at the meeting point, and once complete we headed into the quarry. Here we made our first stop, explaining the geology and paleontology of this area and repeating the security measures. After this the group split in 2, the hardcore collectors went down in the hope to find an elusive trilobite an I took the rest of the group to the top where most fossils were commonly found. Once I found a decent spot I made a small review of the fossils that could be found and the people started looking around. Quickly the first corals and crinoid stems were found and sometimes a brachiopod or a gastropod. After helping anyone finding their way in the quarry I started to look for some nice specimens myself, and secretly hoping to find some cephalopods. The whole morning was quite uneventful, only later I finally found a couple of decent goniatites, and a small round intriguing fossil. One of the members also found a very nice orthoceras in the morning. At 12h we gathered for lunch and a quick review of the discoveries. Then we were surprised by heavy rainfall, it only last for 10 minutes, but more were clearly to come. In the following hour, we had several downpours an several participants started to give up and head back home. I stayed with a dozen participants and after a while we finally had dry weather again. Now we were looking for a layer that I discovered last year with small cephalopods. With a friend we managed to clear 1 m² of that layer, and it turned out great , together we found around 26 goniatites and a bunch of orthoceras and bactrites. Not all were well preserved, but some of them were really good specimens. Finally at 17h we called it a day ,and with the last participants we visited a local tavern for a drink and supper. Double goniatite As for the little round fossil, after some prepping, it turned out to be a crinoid calyx Cheers, Kevin

It has been a while that I made a decent field trip. Past Sunday I left with 2 friends to a quarry in the Ardennes from Belgium. Last year we made a few visits to that place with great success and a fair number of late Devonian cephalopods were found. So hoping to add a few goniatites to our collections we left early in the morning. The weather conditions for the trip were terrible: it was raining and the wind was blowing very hard. Before we got to the quarry the rain stopped, but there was still a lot of wind. The rain had turned most of the flat parts of the quarry into a muddy swamp. But the heavy wind blew the last dark clouds away and we started our prospection in the slag heaps on top of the quarry. The first corals where collected, mostly hexagoniaria and a worn goniatite . I made my find of the day in the first 30 minutes in the quarry: In one of those slag heaps I found a large boulder with a large orthocone on it. The specimen was deformed during fossilization, but after clearing the specimen out it proved to be a complete orthoceras of 25cm in length. This was a monster compared to the most specimens I found there before. The next stop was a level lower in the ancient part of the quarry, here they were dumping the rocks that where not suited for production, but luckily for us, lots of fossils could be found in them. This was the most productive part of the day. Although they were hard to find, each of us found at least a couple of decent goniatites. The rest of the day we spent in the back of the quarry where lots of corals can be found and sometimes a nicely preserved goniatite. Multiple mineral veins are also present with large barite and calcite crystals. Sadly with the expansion of the quarry the part with the corals was cleared with bulldozers and fossil finds where rare at that location. Still I managed to find an exquisite goniatite specimen, a little damaged, but with very clear suture markings. My two friends searched through the mineral veins and found multiple good quality barite and calcite crystals. Meanwhile I prospected other parts and collected a little bag full of small corals and crinoid stems. (Back to the car with heavy Calcite and Barite cristals...) Usually we end our day at a local tavern for a drink, but this time I was too tired and I still had an hour drive to home. I’m already looking forward to my next field trip on 21/02 Then we will be prospecting early carboniferous deposits. Kevin

New fieldtrip to the late and mid Devonian in the Ardennes from Belgium. This weekend I went with my friend Anthonie to a last minute field trip. The weather forecast were promising for that Sunday: gray but dry and decent temperatures so this was a possibility to make a last fieldtrip for this year. So Sunday morning I woke up early to leave for the fieldtrip… of course when I looked outside it was pouring. Still, hoping it could only get better I took the highway to Brussels, picked up my friend and we went to the direction of Marche en Famene for our first stop. It took us a one and a half hour drive in the rain to get there. Luckily the sky got a little less gray and the rain ended. We got to our first stop, a large construction site for a new industrial site. I went there before with my daughter with great success and I wanted to inspect the spot more closely. The huge construction pits exposed late Devonian schists (Frasnian), those deposits are well known to amateur collectors and can deliver a large quantity of spiriferid brachiopods, sometimes of very large dimensions. We spent almost 2 hours on the site, the bulldozers had done a great job clearing everything and we just had to pick up the brachiopods laying around everywhere. It was easy to fill up our bags and we only prospected a small part of the site. Apart from the huge amount of Spirifers, from which a few of them where around 3” we also found solitary corals, and a pair of gastropods. (probably Euomphalus sp.) We then took a quick lunch and headed to a new location a few miles further to a Quarry with mid. Devonian deposits (Givetian) This was the first time we prospected this site, so it took us a while before we could find a few decent fossils. The first ones we found were multiple large colonial corals and stromatolites, giving us a clue about this ancient reef and lagoon system. Most of those where too large to carry around, so we took a few pictures and we continued the prospection. In most parts of the quarry we found other large corals, but when we got to a scree we found multiple small solitary and colonial corals. We inspected this more closely an discovered lots of nice small fossils including a variety of very beautifully preserved brachiopods. After further prospection we went back to the car, making sure to pass by the first spot with the large corals. Where we each took a large specimen back to the car. We had still a little time on our hands and went to a 3rd location, an old quarry. When we got to this spot we were surprised to see that they started to fill up the location with debris. On the positive side the debris where mostly schists from a construction site. And again delivered a few nice spiriferid brachiopods, although very few in numbers. I think another group of collectors must have been screening those debris before us, a large amount of footprints where all around the place. We went to the back of the quarry to take a few extra pictures before heading back home. here I heard small pebbles falling from the cliff at the end of the quarry. We then saw quite a spectacular sight: a fox went down the cliff at an incredible speed, I thought he was stuck and would fell off, but halfway the cliff he went into a hole in the wall. Probably his den. We went closer to get a better sight but we made a new but gruesome discovery. A large dog lay dead at the bottom of the quarry. he probably fell of the cliff and it was not far of the den, so maybe this happened due to the dog chasing the fox. We took a picture of the collar, It had a cellphone number on it. We later contacted the owner to let him know what had happened to his dog. He was sad to hear the news, the dog was missing for two weeks after a hunting party, so this only confirmed our suspicions with the fox. After this incident we got back to the car and headed back home ( again raining during the whole trip) Although the day ended on a sad tone for the dog we did get a lot of great looking fossils. Il post updates of the finds after their first cleanup. Enjoy the pictures: Kevin 1st location: Late Devonian schists Looks like Santa came early this year: 2nd location: Mid Devonian reef deposits: 3rd location: note the piles of schists dumped in the quarry: Thanks to PaleoTony for the pictures.

Fieldtrip in the Belgian Devonian deposits Part 2 Saturday 07/11/2015,I had a new fieldtrip to the quarry that I visited last time. This time, we had a whole group of 25 people from the “BVP” (Belgian group of Paleontology) to guide around the quarry. But we also went to take some specific field notes, a friend of us is studying the stratigraphy of a new part of the quarry. He had marked the specific new layers with paint. The deposits are late Devonian (Frasnian) limestone and schists containing fossils from the ancient reefs nearby. So the most common fossils where corals, crinoid stems, bryozoan, gasteropods and brachiopods. But since the deposits are a little away from the reefs sometimes fossils of swimming predators can be found in the form of shells from Goniatites, Orthocereas or Bactrites. My goal for today was hopefully to find a nice looking cephalopod, I found a few last time so maybe I could find better specimens today. I got there early, so waiting for the group I prospected the debris next to the quarry, This proved to be an excellent start, I found 2 large goniatites and a part of an orthoceras. Although the specimens where very badly preserved and incomplete this was looking very promising. A friend of mine arrived there shortly after. I showed him the fossils and we went back to those piles hoping for more. The next fossils that where found where multiple corals “Hexagonaria” a few crinoid particles and brachiopods. Before we got ready to go down in the quarry to wait for the group , we each found an impressive fossil. I got a complete orthocone from an Orthoceras, I had found fragments of Orthoceras before, mostly not more than a few chambers, but I had never seen one like this. My friend got a complete and good preserved 3.5” goniatite with showed nicely the septa’s of the shell. This was an incredible way to start the trip. my orthocone: Kevin's goniatite: After this we went down to the meeting point where we waited for the group. This was in a trackway for the bulldozers next to a barite vein and before the deposits we were going to prospect. It was at this location that I was sitting next to my bag when I saw the group enter the quarry. At that moment my friend was already trying to dislodge some Barite crystals with a crow bar… I heard him scream, something had gone wrong… He had lost grip of his crowbar resulting in his finger smashed. I went down the track to see what was wrong and while watching my steps I saw some suture lines peering through the mud. I picked it up and realized I found perfectly preserved Goniatite. I then got to my friend with this awkward moment when I had to ask if he was all right while showing him the terrible fossil I just picked up. Only adding to his agony. (sorry Kev. ) the awesome Goniatite: After a litle cleanup at home: After this incident we met with the group and Anthonie the one who organized the field trip. Seeing a few familiar faces and a few new enthusiastic kids new to fossil hunting. Anthonie explained the stratigraphy and age of the deposits. We then passed around some of the fossils we picked up to show everyone what to look for. I then took time to take some of the starting collectors to spots that where easy to prospect and shared info about the specimens they found. I distributed the fossils I found at those spots among the Kids until we gathered for lunch. One of the members found an incredible fossil between the corals and crinoid parts. A perfectly preserved Crinoid calyx with his arms folded into itself. Apparently this kind of position is due to asphyxiation of the animal. But other spectacular specimens where found: During lunch another participant showed us a 2nd crinoid calyx, but this time with his arms unfolded. After lunch I went to another part of the quarry with Kevin and Anthonie that we hadn’t prospected before, this was the old part that they are starting to fill with debris from the new pit. Fossils where much rarer in this part but I managed to pull out 2 extra goniatites out the debris. Anthonie made another impressive find by cracking open a small nodule.: this rock revealed the head of a phacopid trilobite. He contacted an expert this weekend about this and apparently this is the first specimen found in this quarry. Yay, I found another Goniatite: After that the day got to an end, we went back to the group and started to gather all the participants, to head back to the cars and discuss al the great discoveries made that day. Everybody was pleased with their finds and a few of us went for a drink and dinner at a local tavern where we spent the rest of the evening. I hope you all enjoyed reading this report. Kevin Houben ( thanks to Anthonie for the pictures)

Hi everyone! A few weeks ago, I went hunting in the frasnian of Frasnes (Couvin, Belgium). Among crinoïds, brachiopodes and others, I found this beautiful thing. I have no idea of what is it... maybe a cephalopode rostrum but not sure at all. Thanks to GrandBlanc, I have wonderful pictures to show you! Please help me identify it