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Hi everyone, this is a fish I found a few years ago in Santa Barbara. If anyone could help with ID, or provide any resources on fossils in the area it would be greatly appreciated. The fossil is in very soft shale, measures just over 3 inches head to tail, had lots of bivalve and gastropod fossils nearby. I can provide additional pics/info if necessary. Thanks!

Fossil marine vertebrates (Chondrichthyes, Actinopterygii, Reptilia) from the Upper Cretaceous of Akkermanovka (Orenburg Oblast, Southern Urals, Russia) Jambura et al., 2023 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0195667123003075?via%3Dihub Tylosaur (top), Polycotylid (middle), and Plesiosaur indet. teeth from the southern Urals.

Hello everyone, and I hope you've all had a good day. I started to put my display cabinet together today, and after an exhausting day of work, I'm only half done and I haven't even started on the bookshelf! Yay! Sarcasm aside, I've got some more fossils I would like identified, as I am creating labels for my displays. Just as before, I would prefer the most specific identification possible - species would be preferable, but I would rather a genus or clade name over an invalid species name. Location would be helpful too. Again, if any of you want them, I can take more photos tomorrow. Specimen 1: Actinopterygii This specimen I purchased at a museum, which simply labelled it as 'fish fossil'. While I do not know the location, I suspected it was from the Green River Formation in Wyoming, as many commercially available Actinopterygii fossils come from that site. At first, I thought the specimen was Knightia, as that fish seems to be one of the more common from the Green River Formation, and the only common one of the same size and rough shape. However, after recently observing a slab of Knightia at a museum, I began to doubt my initial identification, as the Knightia in the museum looked more bloated than my specimen. Is it a Knightia, or something else? Specimen 2: Ammonite I apologise for the rather shoddy attempt at editing out the supplier's logo. As you can see, I purchased this ammonite in a small plastic case at a museum, and cannot take a photograph of it from all angles. However, the back of the box (or at least what survives of it) says that the ammonite is Jurassic of age and comes from Madagascar (thinking about it, the supplier probably had to stick the ammonite to the case in order to get it through customs). Therefore, after comparing it to other ammonites from the same location, I believe it is most likely a Phylloceras specimen, as those ammonites lived in the correct place at the correct time, and had the same shaped, relatively smooth shell. Do you all agree with this conclusion? Specimen 3: Gastropod Another specimen I purchased from a museum with no knowledge of its original location or age. Unfortunately, I know very little about Gastropods, so I do not know how to identify it. Do any of you recognise at least what group it came from, or even tell its species, time period or location? Specimen 4: Ray tooth I received this tooth as a gift in a set of various teeth from Chondrichthyes. The gift set identified the ray tooth as Jurassic in age, however gave no further information on the specimen. To add to the confusion, all of the fossil ray teeth I have found available to purchase online come from Myliobatis, a genus which only evolved in the Cenozoic. While I am pretty sure it is Myliobatis and the gift set's information was simply inaccurate, I would like confirmation that this conclusion is accurate. Also, I do know that there is only half of a tooth; it broke a while ago and I no longer have the second half. Thank you for all of your help! Next up will be a couple of Triassic plant fossils, and following that will be some fossils I am concerned are fake. Hope you all have a good night!

The Actinopterygian fish (also called ray-fined fish) are the third major group of jawed fish (alongside the Sarcopterygians and Chondrichthyans) that emerged during the Early-Late Silurian 439-425 Million Years ago. The Ray-finned fish were at first not as abundant as the Sarcopterygians, but gradually increased in diversity during the Carboniferous and Permian periods. The Actinopterygians at this time even managed to colonize freshwater habitats. But the group did lose some diversity during Permian-Triassic Extinction Event 252 Million Years ago, though not as much as the Sarcopterygian fish. But thankfully a decent amount of Actinopterygii survived and all living Actinopterygian fish (today one of the most diverse groups of fish currently on Earth) can trace their origins to these few hardy survivors. Here's a list of all currently known Actinopterygian fish genera and families that survived the Permian-Triassic Extinction Event. If I forget any examples, please let me know and I'll add the examples to the list promptly. Actinopterygii Semionotiformes Acentrophorus (Semionotiform) (Late Permian-Early Triassic, 268-242 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=35134 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/230110387_The_Permian_Fishes_of_the_Genus_Acentrophorus https://www.nature.com/articles/042366a0 Palaeonisciformes Pygopterus (Palaeonisciform) (Late Permian-Late Triassic, 259-201 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=149731 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263086548_A_first_record_of_late_Middle_Permian_actinopterygian_fish_from_Anatolia_Turkey https://cpb-eu-w2.wpmucdn.com/blogs.bristol.ac.uk/dist/1/555/files/2021/02/2019Jurong.pdf Atherstonia (Palaeonisciform) (Late Permian-Early Triassic, 259-251 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=263365 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268810424_Permian-Triassic_Osteichthyes_bony_fishes_Diversity_dynamics_and_body_size_evolution Acrolepis (Palaeonisciform) (Early Carboniferous-Late Triassic, 360-201 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=34964 https://publikace.nm.cz/file/2728acfd17332bdb0a1a873988cf3595/18261/sbornik_B_3_4_www_stamberg_1_opr3-FINAL.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268810424_Permian-Triassic_Osteichthyes_bony_fishes_Diversity_dynamics_and_body_size_evolution Acipenseriformes Errolichthys (Acipenseriformes) (Late Permian-Early Triassic, 252.3-251.3 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=241059 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/269406596_Permian-Triassic_Osteichthyes_bony_fishes_diversity_dynamics_and_body_size_evolution_Supplementary_Tables_S1-S3 https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2020.618853/full Bobasatraniiformes Bobasatrania (Bobasatraniiform) (Late Permian-Early Triassic, 252.3-237.5 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=35078 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258034291_Triassic_actinopterygian_fishes_The_recovery_after_the_end-Permian_crisis https://www.researchgate.net/publication/346609564_A_Hiatus_Obscures_the_Early_Evolution_of_Modern_Lineages_of_Bony_Fishes Saurichthyiformes Saurichthys (Saurichthyiform) (Late Permian-Late Jurassic, 252.3-164.7 Million Years ago) http://www.fossilworks.org/cgi-bin/bridge.pl?a=taxonInfo&taxon_no=65068 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/226590807_Vyazniki_biotic_assemblage_of_the_terminal_Permian https://www.readcube.com/articles/10.3389/feart.2020.618853 Hope you all find this list helpful!!!

Hi all, I've had this fossil laying around for a while now, it's some kind of paleoniscid actinopterygian from the Bear Gulch Limestone in Montana USA, Mississippian in age. It's mostly preserved as an impression on a very thin piece of limestone which I framed in a 3D printed frame to make sure it doesn't fall and break, a little bit of the actual material is left but not much, it still has some nice details preserved, you can see all the fin rays, scales and classic actinopterygian skull ornamentation. I am not particularly interested in keeping this piece, and I know the quality isn't particularly great but this material doesn't pop up too often online so I thought maybe someone here on TFF would like it and give it a better home. I haven't done a trade in a while so I thought if someone's interested it could be fun, I'm not looking for anything crazy, just any interesting Paleozoic fossils Thanks for looking! Misha

Red Hill is a site I first went to 10 years ago with my son, Ian who was 10 at the time. It is a very deep road cut into the uppermost part of the Catskill Formation representing a late Fammenian river system that was draining the Acadian mountains to the east and emptying into the inland sea in western PA and OH. It is one of a handful of sites in the world where Devonian tetrapods have been found. The site has fossil layers in both channel margin (red layers) and flood plain (gray-green layers) facies. While it is an active research site and groups go there under the understanding that anything of scientific importance will be donated to the museum, there is a lot there that is redundant in the collections and we've been able to retain. In 2014, Ian found an exceptionally preserved moderately large osteolepiform, Hyneria (Tristichopteridae). Some of the material went into the re-description of Hyneria, much we have been allowed to take home. Since then the project has expanded to a search for more tetrapod material using the jackhammer and generator the museum purchased. This may require multiple posts. I'll start with the jaws recovered over 2014/15 seasons. This lens containing most of the head from apparently a single individual. Here Ian is working with Ted Daeschler and Doug Rowe (site manager) of the Academy Of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia. Here are some images of the jaw material after removal and after prep by Fred Mullison of the ANSP. Lower left jaw after removal. This is the lower right jaw (right) and the vomer and very impressive fang. Amazingly, in 2016, we went back. I was leading a trip for DVPS. Ian found this amazing but poorly prepped jaw (I did this one). Here are a pair of cleithrums, about 29 cm long. The attachments for the scapulocoracoid are clearly visible between 17 and 21 cm. Here is part of the parietal shield. More to follow.