Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'cannon'.
-
I was out hunting fossils yesterday and was quite successful, although many of the finds were covered with algae, concretions and unusually stained. There were fewer small shark teeth and many larger, broken, fragmented mammal bones. Found a number of Equus, camel, and possibly modern calf teeth... damaged and encrusted. The larger bones potentially identifiable are most interesting. That's a couple of Camel (likely Hemiauchenia.sp) Metatarsal 3s in the left middle. a phalanx and very small Ulna in the right middle of the photo. For this thread, I am interested in identifying the mammal that produced this fossil below. It is 180 mm long Cannon bone. Sometimes called a Metacarpal3 or Metatarsal3... Comparing to the Hemiauchenia Metatarsals in the above photo, this bone comes from a much smaller mammal. Here is the end of the bone, which is usually diagnostic. The narrow part of the bone (around 120 mm in the above photo) is 14 mm high and 16 mm wide.
-
With the River and creeks WAAAAY over my head, I have started to sort, review, reduce my collections from the last 3-4 months, starting from the most recent. I have a couple of interesting bones. The 1st I think in a cannon bone from a small pre_equus horse. Why small pre_equus horse? I find 1 Equus fossil at this location for every 100 pre_Equus horse fossils, plus this bone is too small to be an Equus cannon bone. Why Cannon bone ? Because it seems very similar to a photo of Equus Cannon bone created by @Harry Pristis. Harry identified as left leg, Mine seems to be the opposite oriented for a right leg. Metacarpal is the foreleg designation. How can the metacarpal be differentiated from the metatarsal (hind leg) that seems very similar? My find: Not impressive in this 1st photo. There are some differences with Harry's photo above, but I can not imagine what else it might be....
-
This complete metacarpal, a.k.a. cannon bone is an extremely rare find for North Carolina. Pleistocene mammals are uncommon and are mostly teeth. Being complete and undamaged it will be taking a prominent spot in my collection. The bone was found in a quarry containing mixed sediments of Pliocene Yorktown Formation, which is marine and a Pleistocene pebble lag. The odds are very very small that this would be from the Pliocene, so I am going on my gut feeling that this is from the Pleistocene. I also would like to send thanks to forum member @Fruitbat and @Harry Pristis for giving me a positive I.D. on this.
- 3 comments