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Showing results for tags 'Texas'.
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I've noticed that despite the seeming abundance of Pleistocene deposits shown on geologic maps such as this one (https://txpub.usgs.gov/txgeology/), finding how or where they expose is much more difficult. On the geologic maps I use, when I hunt late cretaceous fossils, for example, late cretaceous exposures area all classified specifically with their own names (Eagle Ford, Ozan, Del rio clay, etc.). I can then research each individual formation, and it makes narrowing down spots much easier. It seems that for Pleistocene exposures, there are no "formation names" assigned to them. This makes it hard to make my research about them specific. Obviously some Pleistocene exposures must be better than others, and many probably have their own unique identifying characteristics, but I can't research any of that, as it seems all the Pleistocene occurrences on the map are just given blanket names like "terrace deposits " or "high gravel deposits". So, how do I direct my research to be successful for finding productive Pleistocene spots? Are there any Texans too who can tell me how the local geology looks with productive Pleistocene stuff? Any or all advice from anyone would help.
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- central texas
- geologic maps
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I'm visiting family in San Antonio, Texas, and have been doing a little fossil hunting as well, including in a nearby creek. Based on a local geologic map, I believe this creek mostly exposes the Edwards Group (Albian age), though there appear to be some younger (Cenomanian age) rocks from the Del Rio Formation mixed in as well, based on an Ilymatogyra arietina shell that I found a couple of days ago. This creek isn't very fossiliferous. In about 3 hours of searching, I've only found a single I. arietina and a few small shell impressions in rocks. However, today, I also found the rock below and am wondering if it's something more. I am moderately confident that the bit in the lower right is a shell impression. What I'm unsure of is whether there's a bigger (worn) shell mold here too or just a bit of pareidolia. Any thoughts? Here's the outline of what I'm seeing -- the dimensions of what I've outlined are approximately 7cm wide x 6cm tall. Here's further detail of the part in the lower right that I'm more confident is part of a fossil shell/shell impression: The "shell mold" is raised relative to the surrounding rock, though is pretty heavily eroded if it is a fossil: Here as well is the I. arietina I found -- no doubt that this one's a fossil at least! And here's a wider shot of the creek: Thanks for looking!
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Here’s a tooth from the Brazos River in Texas. I can’t tell how complete it is. It seems different than bos/bison and deer. I have no experience with pronghorn material , but I’m wondering if it’s a possibility
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I live near the western edge of Henderson County in Texas. It's a fairly flat area with few outcrops of any kind exposed, and even when they are, they aren't very fossiliferous. The county just west of me is Navarro County, and it does actually have some formations that hold fossils. But I haven't had much luck finding anything in Navarro County. I keep looking, since it's so close. I did a long hike down a Navarro County creek yesterday. For most of the day, it looked like another of those trips where I just don't find anything. But one thing I've learned about fossil hunting is that even after hours of unproductive searching, it only takes one small spot to make you end up bringing home some cool stuff. Yesterday, I eventually found that small spot. The area I hunted is Wolfe City formation. I just didn't have any luck finding anything in the gravel bars in the creek, or in the outcrops themselves. But I did stumble on an outcrop that had some fossils in the mud just below it. For those who enjoy "Find the fossil", here are some in situ photos. That pick is small. The handle is about 55 mm long.
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I had a scare last week that has made decide to stay away from the North Sulphur River feeder creeks for good. It all started when I decided to check out google maps to find a more remote access point since the river has become so picked over. I found a feeder creek that had a bridge that emptied into the NSR and decided to try it out. Well it took an hour just to get halfway all the while I was clomping though thick mud. I then turned a corner and came face to face with a 200 plus pound wild boar. I must have rustled it up from sleeping because it shot up once it saw me and started snorting. By this point I was stuck in the mud again, in the middle of the creek, but luckily it did not charge me. I franticly unstuck myself and backed away slowly and somehow climbed an almost vertical cliff wall. It is amazing what you can do if you have to. I observed the boar trying to climb out of the creek and luckily for me it was to the other side of the creek. I was amazed by how fast and how good at climbing it was even for its massive size. I walked the rest of the way to the river above the creek, looking back about every five seconds to make sure nothing was behind me. Once I made it to the river I made a decision to stay out of those feeder creeks for good. It wouldn't matter what I found in it because it wouldn't be worth going though that again so from now on ill just walk my way from one of the NSR access points. Not to mention all I found the entire two hours was a small broken shark tooth. However once I made it to the river I actually did find a couple of nice finds. I was excited to find my first ever mosasaur tooth in pictures 3 and 4. However it is a strange tan color and I really would have liked the nice shiny black that I see so much on here. I also found a piece of mosasaur jaw fragment in pictures 9 and 10 that might have actually housed the tooth I found earlier haha. In picture 5 I found a fully intact sawfish rostral tooth. And lastly in picture 22 I found a piece of Baculite that had some really nice preservation on it. The rest are items I'm not too sure about so please let me know if you see something in these pictures I wasn't able to identify. See below: Is picture 2 a shark or fish vert? Any idea what pictures 6, 7, and 8 are of? Picture 11 looks like it might be fish bones in coprolite or maybe matrix? Picture 12 is turtle maybe? Pictures 13 and 14 appear to be bone so maybe a part of mosasaur paddle? Pictures 15 and 16 are very similar to 13 and 14 however the fossilization is much newer so I am thinking Pliocene mammal? Picture 17 maybe fish jaw? Picture 18 and 19 also fish jaw? Picture 20 is not a fossil but maybe pyrite? And picture 21 is just a strange piece of mosasaur bone that has about 4 rounded cavities on it. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22.
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- cretaceous
- mosasaur
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Hey y'all, here are two finds from two different trips that I'm having trouble IDing 1.) This Ptychodus from the sprinkle formation ( a tongue of the Ozan here in central Texas). I'm not sure, but I think the sprinkle formation around here is Santonian in age (~86-83 myo). (Please chip in if you actually know - google is so vague here) I have a suspicion, but I don't want to count my eggs before they hatch for this one. Any ideas? 2.) What I suspect might be a Cretoxyrhina mantelli (not sure if I see evidence of broken cusps or not, so I included many photos to help show that), from what I believe might be a permanent Eagle Ford exposure here in Williamson County, central texas (exciting stuff!). The blade seems a bit thin. Any ideas?
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- austin
- central texas
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It was a slow day at the North Sulphur River. With no rain I wasn't surprised the river was really picked over. I did find one medium sized shark or fish vert. I also found something that I have no idea what it is. Fossil, geological, or man made? Anyone have any idea what is in pictures 3, 4, and 5? 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
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- cretaceous
- mosasaur
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I had the pleasure of arranging a special fossil hunt to the Red Beds of Texas - a famous Permian site that was originally described by Copes in 1870's and later by Romer. It's an old quarry on private land that we were able to take a group of 10 to hunt on. And I was corrected by our guide that it was really not so much a "hunt" as a "collect" because the fossils were literally EVERYWHERE! You could sit in a 10 foot radius circle and be picking up vertebrate material all day long! We collected for about 5 hours and everyone came away with some fabulous fossils. Lots of amphibian skull pieces, sometimes with jaws and teeth sockets, vertebrae, lots of little toe bones, shark teeth and spines and much more. Most were small things, but occasionally you'd fine a nice big vert or piece of bone. Full Dimetrodon skeletons have been recovered from this site as well as amphibian Eryops and others. Here are some of my favorites from the "collection"! Dimetrodon toe bone: 3/8 inch Amphibian Eryops Toe bone: 1 inch Eryops ungal (toe bone) 1/2 inch Eryops jaw and tooth sockets - 1 inch Amphibian skull fragment (the biggest bit I found - 1 1/2 inches) Eryops Tooth: 1/4 inch Another jaw fragment - 1/2 inch An unknown tooth: 1/8 inch Orthocanthus shark tooth (Fresh water shark - there were HUNDREDS if not thousands of these teeth, but rarely do you find a complete one. Some were big, almost an inch, but this one was 1/4 inch) The blue color is amazing Some awesome little amphibian tooth plates, all around 1 inch This one has little teeth that look like hersheys kisses! smaller one - 1/2 inch my best vertebra (found about 4 but most were crunchy). 3/4 inch A lungfish tooth 1/2 inch Lots of other bits and pieces of bones and spines: This is a Dimetrodon sail spine fragment. Some of the others found even better bits. 1/2 inch Edaphosaurus spine spur (a different type of Dimetrodon). Size 1 inch I can't wait to go back out again - I hope to find a Dimetrodon claw (a couple of the group did). Next time!!
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- 16
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- archer city
- dimetrodon
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Went out for a quick hunt this week in a creek I frequent in Collin County Texas. Found a couple of broken teeth and a nice partial artifact and was about to turn around when I noticed why looked like fish bone on a chunk of matrix poking out from the gravel. I moved the gravel and it exposed an entire skull in the matrix. This is only the second fish I have found in the Eagle Ford. Appears to be a skull of a type of tselfatiiform. Going to get prep work done to expose more detail and see if I can get species identified.
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- collin county
- cretaceous
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This photo was sent from a person who knows nothing about fossils or geology so the questions far outnumber any answers. We hope to see it in person in 2 weeks or so and will then determine the location, confirm the formation, and provide the size. The area around Jacksboro Texas, the only information we have now, is mostly the Graham formation, so that makes it marine deposits in the Cisco group, Late Pennsylvanian. I have tried to imagine it could be a bryozoan or some kind of plant but nothing I know of is a good fit. I thought maybe someone here might recognize it.
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This may be a very Texas-centric post. Hopefully my fellow Texans will be able to help. I am sorting out specimens from the Walnut Formation here in Austin. These particular fossils were collected from the Bee Cave Member. The Walnut is part of the Fredericksburg Group and the age is Albian (Lower Cretaceous). There are three species of the oyster Ceratostreon known from our local rocks: C. texanum (Roemer), C. weatherfordensis (Cragin) & C.hilli (Cragin). If anyone is more familiar with these and can confirm my tentative identification I would be grateful. So the QUESTION regards the ones I have labeled C. weatherfordensis. The others that are C. texanum I have no doubts about. Those are classic marker fossils for the Fredericksburg Group and are distinct. take a look at the pics...
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As it looks like I won't be able to make it back out to Charleston for quite a while, I was wondering what the fossil hunting scene looks like here in Texas. I've heard that there's some miocene material to be had around Galveston and Bolivar, and I've heard about the Eagle Ford Formation and Post Oak Creek, but I haven't come across a whole lot of information. I do know there are some invertebrate fossils along the Brazos, but I'm not super big on snails. I'm in the Houston area, so a day trip down to the coast is definitely feasible, but I need to do some more research before I commit to making a trip up to North Texas, which seems to be where most of the action is. Can someone just give me a quick rundown on the general information I need to know?
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Hi guys, I have had a few opinions that this doesn’t look like a Cretaceous tooth, and I do admit it looks a bit like a brachycarcharias, but I wanted to see what you all thought, I bought it as a cenomian tooth from the waco spillway thanks for your help
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On Tuesday, I made a trip back to the East Texas creek where I had found micro teeth last month. This creek is a Kincaid Formation outcrop. I had found the one and only productive area there just before I had to leave last time, so wanted to explore it better. Rain threatened the entire time I was there Tuesday, but it didn't really rain hard until I had gotten back home. Unlike my last time there, I found very little soft matrix on top of the limestone this time. At first, I wondered if it was just because our dry spell lately had hardened everything, but the more I explored, the more I came to realize that most of the softer matrix had just already been chiseled off. It's a reminder of how hard it is to find spots that aren't over hunted here in Texas. I didn't find many teeth at all this time, but brought home some suspicious matrix from where I did find a few teeth. I just finished going through that matrix, and sure enough, it did have a few more teeth in it. Here is what I got from the trip, including what I found in the matrix.
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- kincaid formation
- paleogene
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Hello, I found this small shark tooth near Austin. The geology of the area corresponds to the Ozan formation (early Campanian) ~78 million years. It looks like a Serratolamna serrata tooth, but I haven’t heard of Serratolamna from the Ozan formation. Or could this be a Cretalamna appendiculata instead?
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I found this a few weeks ago at an exposure of the Late Pennsylvanian Colony Creek Shale in west-central Texas. I have no idea what it could be. It seems like a partial something, but I just don't know what. Maybe some type of cephalopod? Any thoughts are greatly appreciated. I thought the pattern was interesting enough to pick it up and try to figure it out. Thank you!
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils : Rudists
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- cretaceous
- glen rose formation
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils : Rudists
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- cretaceous
- euradiolites
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils : Rudists
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- caprulinoidea
- cretaceous
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils : Rudists
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- cretaceous
- glen rose formation
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils: Oysters
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils: Oysters
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils: Oysters
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From the album: Texas Cretaceous Fossils: Oysters
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