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So I've just realized the "alligator skull" fossil my parents got me for Christmas last year is for sure a fake. I'm embarassed I didn't notice until trying to ID the species, the real mosasaur teeth threw me off. My parents really went all out spending a couple hundred dollars on this thing, it's the most expensive gift I've ever recieved. So I'm pretty upset they got scammed out of that much money. I imagine it's been too long to demand a refund, but is there anything I can do about this? Was this even legal? The place that sold it to us is an actual shop, not some shady pop-up vendor. I apologize if this isn't the correct place to ask my question, let me know if it's not appropriate.

Unknown fossil. Found in Pleistocene material. Inland, Venice, Florida. Specimen measures 65mm x 60mm. Smooth portion is 42mm high. I have found both Equus teeth and alligator jaw in same location. This item is a first for me. It appears to be possibly a caudal vertebra? Image 2 has a concave surface. Image 4 has a convex surface like it would match up with another concave surface. I think I have seen a photo of it before somewhere but I don't recall. Thank you for your ID assistance. -Regards, Michael

I believe this is a crocodile or alligator tooth but it's much larger than the ones that I have or that I have seen. Is that what I have?

Founded at a land site in Sarasota. I think it's alligator, what kind of vertebrae are these

Found the most complete vertebrae today. Caramel brown with intact neural canal. Same location I recovered a Hesperotestudo crassiscutata carapace in January. Inland Venice, Florida. Mostly Pleistocene material here. I don't think it is a gator. Your assistance is appreciated. -Regards,

Hi everyone! I recently got some Florida Pleistocene fossils and I'm having some trouble identifying them. I think the first is a wolf molar and the third is either a turtle or alligator claw but beyond that I'm stumped. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Because of a recent post by @GPayton I went through a pile of unidentified bones and found three vertebrae that I think might be alligator or crocodile. These are from the Brazos River in Texas. Please confirm that these are crocodilian if possible…. @Harry Pristis @fossilus @Shellseeker here’s #1

Found this almost complete vertebra on the Brazos River near Houston several months ago, missing only one of the larger processes and one of the smaller ones. I initially assumed it was just another horse or bison vertebra which are pretty common around here, but after looking at it again I realized that, although worn, one side is convex and the other is concave like in reptile vertebrae. After looking at some pictures online it bears some resemblance to alligator vertebrae. If that's what it is I would be overjoyed since the only other alligator material Ive found before is a single osteoderm about a year ago. As always, if someone could confirm my tentative ID I'd be very grateful. And an in-situ just for fun:

I haven't posted in a while, but have had some pretty good hunts over the last couple of years. This year has been busy with work. I made it down to the river for some fossil hunting for my first time in 2021 last Friday. I had a really nice day. The weather was beautiful. I had great visiblity. I'm hoping to go again tomorrow. I took some photos of some of the days finds. First photo: - One of the things I was most excited about is a potential talon of a bird of prey. It is broken, but you can see it in the photos below. I am pretty excited about this. I actually bought a couple of fossil eagle claws several years ago. I don't buy many fossils and I really never buy anything that I think I have a chance to come accross in my hunts, so this was totally unexpected. - I also found more shark teeth than usual. A lot of them are in poor condition, but there were a couple that were nice. - I found several gator teeth and a couple osteoderm pieces. These are pretty common from my experience with the area. I do like the one with the root though. None of them are very big. - I found a number of fish spines, scales, mouth plates. Those are all pretty common. - I found three items that i'm not sure of. My guess is that they are turtle beaks, but i'm not sure that's right. If anyone has an ID on that, it would be much appreciated. I don't think I have found these before, but I'm probably just forgetting b/c I found 3 in one day. Second photo: - I found the typical bone fragments and tried not to keep as much broken stuff as I usually do. The cannon bone and the bone above and to the left were found within a few feet of each other just laying on top. I love finding any bones that are complete, and I think a lot of times that happens to be bones in the tow and ankle because they are smaller. I'm not sure the species of what's below, but I would guess horse and deer. I find some smaller bones too which I think are too things like rodents and birds (when hollow), but I'm not 100% sure. I also think I found a fossil twig. The item labeled "Unk 2?" is something that is very common. I always thought these were from turtles, but I'm really not sure. - When I do find bone fragments and they include the connector pieces sometimes I keep them. The one in the second photo seemed like it had a similar shape to the end of the horse cannon, but it is much larger. - I always like finding mammal teeth (several photos). I found a number of mammel teeth, but most were in very poor condition. I think that one of them was from a camel, but i'm not sure. - I think i found the deer hoof claw core, which I was happy to find. I was very happy to see the giant beaver tooth. I think that's the best one I have ever found. The other side doesn't look as good as this side. - I think I found a peice of a rodent jaw. Not my best. I have seen them with teeth and the incisor in the past. - I always love finding canines. This is one of the smallest I have found. I'm guessing racoon, but I really have no idea. Sorry, I don't think the photo is very good on that one. - I also really like turtle shell especially if the patterns on it are nice. I picked up probably way to much, but here are a few of the nicer pieces. - I think that I found a peice of a crab claw, not too pretty, but not something I see a lot of. I have found several peices of what I think are crab shells, I will have to post some somtime. Photo 3 - I think this is a piece of a turtle shell, but it's not very similar to what I usually find. - some additional foot bones (I think) - I am not sure about these other two. I think maybe one is part of an alligator osteoderm and another is part of an alligator skull, but I really don't know. If anyone has any ideas on that, I'd love to hear it. Photo 4: - Partial mastadon tooth. Finding a complete one is on my list of things I would really love to find. I find peices fairly regularly, but this is probably bigger than most. - The top photo on the right, is something I see all the time. I'm not 100% sure what it is, but I think it's some type of fish. - The other photo is a bunch of random stuff, I'm not sure if any of them are interesting, there are some more photos of some of these on the next photo. Photo 5 This photo has a bunch of stuff that I thought was interesting, but I really don't know what they are. Some of them maybe nothing, but if anything looks interesting let me know. If I had to guess: - Unk 3 - maybe just a bone fragment, shape made it seem like a claw core, but not sure - Unk 4 - I was thinking that this might be a part of cannine with the enamel worn down, but I think it's probably just a phosphate pellet - Unk 5 - I thought maybe a tip of a mastadon tooth, but this seems wrong. Not sure. - Unk 6 - not sure... Outer layer seems to be enamel, so i'm thinking some kindof mammel tooth? - Unk 7 - part of an herbivore mammel (horse maybe) tooth that just wore and broke in a weird way? - Unk 8 - maybe just a weird shaped phosphate pellet - Unk 9 - maybe just a broken bit of a tooth. the shape repminds me of a type of sawfish, but I think that would be more flat and less round. - Unk 10 - not sure, just broken bone peice maybe - Unk 11 - not sure maybe a trace fossil

Not sure about others, but I realize that I am finding bones that I have yet to recognize, but think might be alligator. Found this nice comparison photo... What is the name of these bones? Are they ribs? Did I find one of them here? A couple more. I think the 2nd photo is a Calcaneum, what is the first and is either this bone?

Hey guys! I'm hoping someone can help me ID this bone? I found it a little while ago in a river close to me in south Florida. I feel like it’s something obvious like a gator or a bovine but I can’t get a definite answer and it always drives me nuts when I can’t ID a bone! I’ve found one or two others similar to this in the past.

Hi everyone! Long time lurker, first time poster haha. I’m still kind of new to this so sorry if this is a super obvious ID, but I was wondering what kind of tooth this is exactly. I was thinking crocodile, but it seems to have a slightly different shape so I wasn’t sure. I found it at Ginnie Sprints in High Springs on the Santa Fe River in Florida. It’s about 2 1/4” long. Thank you in advance for your help!

Just came back from an afternoon at the FLMNH vertebrate paleontology warehouse sorting through bone bags from the Montbrook site. Richard Hulbert, Collection Manager, was there as well working on cataloging specimens from the trays of catalogable specimens that I'd separated from the scrappy bones last month. He came over to show me a set of 3 neural bones from the carapace of the Trachemys slider turtle that is ubiquitous at the site. I remember seeing these 3 bones (neurals 3 through 5) that run along the midline of the turtle's upper shell (carapace) when I determined they were associated and fit together. Associated bones are cataloged as a set rather than as individual bones. I recall these bones having rounded markings on them but likely was distracted with something else and didn't take the time to dig out the pits of lithified sand that filled these cavities. Richard took the time to clean out the matrix and it was quite apparent that this was one lucky turtle (depending on your point of view). You can clearly see that an alligator had managed to get this turtle into its mouth and had bit down at least twice leaving two distinct rows of tooth marks along the midline of this turtle's shell. The wounds are slightly healed and the fact that the neurals were found in close proximity within one of the grid squares and were not found digested and part of a gator coprolite means that this lucky turtle survived the attack and continued to live for some time after. Always fun when these little taphonomic clues can be interpreted to tell something of the life story of the individual. Cheers. -Ken

Hello all Up for trade I offer this nice set of Shark tooth Hill teeth from Kern County California. In return for this set, or individual teeth I would like to get crocodile or crocodile-like (alligator, Phytosaurs...) teeth from as many various locations/species as possible. This group of animals is a bit underappreciated I think, but last time I lend some fossils to the local school, there were some crocodile teeth among them and the kids really loved them and that surprised me a bit. Anyway, I hope I can expand my crocodile collection a bit. These teeth are available for trading: Upper row: Allodesmus tooth, two unknown whale teeth, Desmostylus tooth, Allodesmus canine (glued) Lower row: Dolphin ear bone?, Rooted Allodesmus tooth, Rooted whale tooth. I already got: Still undetermined species from the Hell Creek Formation, USA Phytosaur teeth from the Chinle formation, USA Geosaurine Metriorhynchid, from Painten, Germany Unknown species from Unknown formation or location in Argentina Multiple species from the Kem Kem beds in Morocco Sarcosuchus imperator from the Elrhaz formation in NIger. Machimosaurus sp. from Portugal. Yet unidentified tooth from France (Self found). Might be crocodile, might be other reptile. Alligator teeth from Florida USA. What I really want: Big croc tooth from Java, Indonesia Pallimnarchus tooth or jaw piece from Australia Razanandrongobe tooth from Madagascar Kaprosuchus tooth from Niger Deinosuchus tooth from the USA Croc crowns (+6cm) or rooted croc teeth from Kem Kem. Crocodile teeth from Dinosaur bearing formations throughout the USA Canadian croc tooth. I'm also interested in other crocodile teeth, depending on country, or condition.. Size isn't really important. So far, on a map, these are the countries I got crocodile teeth from: Who, oh who could help me to paint this map more red.

Here's a third North American Alligatorid named this year, discovered in the Late Cretaceous Atlantic coast, from New Jersey to Mississippi. This follows a post I made on Friday, Dec. 18, concerning two others discovered this year: 3. Deinosuchus schwimmeri A systematic review of the giant alligatoroid Deinosuchus from the Campanian of North America and its implications for the relationships at the root of Crocodylia ABSTRACT: Deinosuchus is a lineage of giant (≥10 m) Late Cretaceous crocodylians from North America. These were the largest semiaquatic predators in their environments and are known to have fed on large vertebrates, including contemporaneous terrestrial vertebrates such as dinosaurs. Fossils have been found in units of Campanian age from northern Mexico to Montana in the west and Mississippi to New Jersey in the east. Three species have been named, and recent consensus suggests that they represent a single, widely ranging species. The authors studied newly collected material from western Texas and increased sampling from throughout North America to review species-level systematics of Deinosuchus and help refine its phylogenetic placement among crocodylians. Deinosuchus from eastern and western North America can be consistently differentiated and represent different species. A phylogenetic study is conducted including new character states. This work reinforces the identity of the ‘terror crocodile’ as an alligatoroid. Reference to the holotypes indicates that the generic name holder, Deinosuchus hatcheri, is extremely incomplete. As a result, the three known species of Deinosuchus cannot be differentiated. To ensure nomenclatural stability, the type species for Deinosuchus should be transferred to Deinosuchus riograndensis, a species known from multiple mostly complete individuals. Additionally, Deinosuchus rugosus is based on a holotype that is not diagnostic, and a new species, Deinosuchus schwimmeri, is named to encompass some specimens formerly assigned to D. rugosus. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02724634.2020.1767638 News article: http://www.sci-news.com/paleontology/deinosuchus-schwimmeri-08730.html Image credit: Cossette and Brochu. doi: 10.1080/02724634.2020.1767638.

Two new species of Alligatorids were discovered this year, one in Florida, another in Texas. The one from Florida seems to bridge the extinct A. mefferdi, to the extant A. mississippiensis, sharing characteristics of both. 1. Alligator hailensis New early Pleistocene Alligator (Eusuchia: Crocodylia) from Florida bridges a gap in Alligator evolution ABSTRACT: The American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis) is one of two species of Alligator in the modern world. It is only distantly related to the other extant species (A. sinensis), with much closer relatives known from the geologic past of North America. A disparity exists, though, in the fossil record between A. mississippiensis and its close relative, the late Miocene (?)—early Pliocene A. mefferdi. While A. mississippiensis is known from the mid-Pleistocene and later, few Alligator remains were known from the earliest Pleistocene of North America until the discovery of the Haile 7C and 7G early Pleistocene (Blancan Land Mammal Age) sites from Alachua County, Florida. The Haile alligators exhibit a suite of characters from both A. mississippiensis and A. mefferdi, displaying intermediate morphology in time. The Haile alligators are distinct from either of the aforementioned taxa, and a new species, Alligator hailensis is suggested, bridging an important gap in the evolution of the American Alligator. https://www.biotaxa.org/Zootaxa/article/view/zootaxa.4868.1.3 Image below of Alligator hailensis is by Jeremy B. Stout. Creative Commons 4.0 (CC By.SA.4.0) 2. Bottosaurus fustidens A new species of Bottosaurus (Alligatoroidea: Caimaninae) from the Black Peaks Formation (Palaeocene) of Texas indicates an early radiation of North American caimanines ABSTRACT: Morphological and molecular data suggest a close relationship for alligators and caimans. The first fossil appearances combined with phylogenetic hypotheses suggest a divergence of the groups near the Cretaceous–Palaeogene boundary, but the early fossil record of Caimaninae is incomplete, and large gaps exist between the earliest representatives of the group. A new caimanine from lower Palaeocene (Tiffanian) deposits in the Black Peaks Formation of Brewster County, Texas is established upon two specimens of different size that bear similarities to Bottosaurus harlani from the uppermost Cretaceous and lowermost Palaeogene of New Jersey. The larger individual consists of a partial skull and lower jaw in addition to postcranial material. The smaller individual preserves a snout and posterior portions of the skull. Both specimens suggest an animal with a comparatively short, flat, broad snout. Species of Bottosaurus share diagnostic morphological character states but are differentiated in meaningful ways. Phylogenetic analysis shows that the new species is sister to B. harlani, indicates an early radiation of North American caimanines and elucidates a more complicated biogeographical history than previously hypothesized. A growing body of evidence suggests that Caimaninae may be diagnosed by ancestral characters, potentially drawing basal alligatoroids crownwards in phylogenetic trees. https://academic.oup.com/zoolinnean/article-abstract/191/1/276/5815831

Location: South Texas Found: Gravel, sand, low water Estimated time: Pleistocene I've been searching through info on scutes, osteoderms, reptile fossils, and types of turtle shell and plastron parts because we seem to have a lot of those in our area, but I'm having a hard time telling the difference. These are my best guesses, and I'm hoping someone can educate me on the differences. FRAG 1--I think this is a large turtle/tortoise scute fragment, but I'm not sure how to tell the difference between neural, costal, central, etc. FRAG 2--I believe this is an osteoderm (because it looks like skin instead of part of a shell?), but I'm not sure the type. Maybe alligator? FRAG 3--My husband thought this may just be a rock, but I thought it looked like a fossilized shell plate of a turtle. It's relatively thin. We see a lot of these on the river. FRAG 4--This looked like another osteoderm to me because it has a similar texture on top to Frag2. But it's much thinner and the edges are more defined. Any info would be a big help! Thank you. --Brandy

Here's a 1" tooth found in Florida. It looks narrower than I'd expect for an alligator, and there are also striations which I believe are prominent in crocodiles. Would it be a crocodile?

I have here a 25mm long tooth from Bone Valley, Polk County, Florida. It is from the Miocene. The seller advertises this as a crocodile tooth. To me, it looks alligator. I could be wrong; how might one differentiate?

From North of San Antonio in Cretaceous Zone. Could be a leverite but this one looked a bit weird. Pretty small.

Good morning, please take a look at this artifact I discovered a few weeks ago and help me identify if this is something other than a rock with unique features and patterns. I have spent FAR too much time closely inspecting it and I'm convienced that it is something other than a naturally forming rock. Altough I'm not an expert in geology, I have collected thousands upon thousands of artifacts which is one of the reasons this one clearly stood out to me. The color, shape, pattern, and texture is very distinct. Please note that this artifact is not whole and has been broken in half. The photos are top down. What I see is a fossilized creature curled up in what could be an egg or borrow. It looks to be reptillian based off the patten of what could be the underbelly on one side of the fossil and the shape of the what I believe woud be the snout of the head (again it has been partially broken off). Also, there seems to be a long tail that wraps around the circumfrence of the unit and centered in the middle is the snout/head. When carefully observing the interior of where the break occurred, there apprears to be the spinal column (color differentation) originating from the head that may have lead to the torso as well as part of the torso. Lastly, there appears to be some digits to a claw (encircled). If anybody want to contact me for additional details, please don't hesitate.

I'm seeking feedback on what exactly is this bone-looking structure. It seems to closely resemble the tip of an alligator's toes. Do you think this is something that could happen to naturally forming rock? I cropped in closely to the image so it can be clearly seen. It measures 8mm from top to tip. I would sincerely appreicate any expert insight into what this could be.

Hi everyone, I have some stuff that was found in the Peace River, Florida. I think I have an idea what these are, but confirmation would be great! First off, a horse tooth? Could anything more specific be identified? It's 2" Then there's this, and I think it's alligator scute. 1 inch Lastly, alligator tooth partial? 1 inch long

Hey guys, here's a fossil hunt I did with my Dad. We absolutely crushed it with a fossilized dire wolf tooth, a huge bison vertebra, two extinct Florida camel vertebras, a gorgeous extinct peccary tooth, some Giant Armadillo scutes and a few other things to boot. Hope you enjoy!

Hi, I am an alligator from Florida's Peace River. I live in a drainage pipe near an unnamed overpass on Highway 17. I hear that fossil-hunters often have questions regarding me and my fellow reptiles. I will now answer any and all questions.