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Expanding from my KemKem collection. And no better way to start with a big Dentary of Sarcosuchus Imperator! Really really hard to find. Elhraz Fm.

Hello. My name is Daniel. I am simply an amateur collector, but been doing it for over 35 years. So, I have rocks all over my house and my wife says she lives in a museum. I’ve found much of my collection on hikes and trips to quarries. The rest I’ve gathered here and there.

Hi been looking at this forum for a while and decided I can contribute and learn something. I love Dinosaurs and a super supporter Nanotyrannus as a valid species. Just makes sense when you see the evidence. Off my soapbox happy to be here.

Hello guys , I am a fossil collector , who wants to learn more about prehistoric live , fossils and how to identify them . I Love this Forum and wanted to become a part of it , because I found Here so many informations about fossils , which I couldnt find anywhere else . I Hope , I'll have a great time here 😊

I am new from New Mexico, USA. Am not sure how to post and this may be a reply to another new member introduction.

Hello! My name is Elaine Scott. I am a new member to the forum. Exploring the mountains in the high desert and rock/fossil hunting is a hobby of mine. I have a small collection of interesting items. Some of which I will ask for help identifying, I look forward to feedback! I see there's soo much content to explore on this site I'm pretty sure I'll spend the next several hours (and many more in days to come) scrolling through it all. I hope everyone has a great day!

Hi everyone, My name is Rob, I'm a 21 year old biology student from the Netherlands and I've recently rekindled my passion for fossils. After browsing this forum for a while I decided to become a member! I currently own a handful of fossils, ranging from the Pleistocene to the Carboniferous (including a plant fossil I found myself at a former coal mine). I'm looking forward to learning more about fossils identification, ethical fossil hunting and paleontology in general

Hi all from rural Worcestershire in the UK. Been collecting around 20 years but have now really got the bug!! Recently started prepping and getting lost in the shed for hours and hours. Looking forward to contributing in the future and conversing with like minded souls. Kind regards Craig

Hi all, I was invited by a fellow fossil enthusiast to join this forum, after being active on the largest German fossil forum "Steinkern.de" for about a decade now. I'm a geologist by profession. but actually more a paleontologist by training and passion. My scientific interest is mostly on vertebrate paleontology, but as a collector I'm interested in a broad range of things, from geolocical and paleontological oddities, to rare specimens from historic locations or just really anything from any time period that has an interesting story to tell (hence the username). My 'core' collection is focused mostly on own finds from the Triassic and Jurassic of Germany and adjacent areas, but since I moved to the western part of Germany, there's an increasing number of Devonian and Carboniferous finds in my collection. Last year, I had the amazing opportunity to join a dinosaur dig in Wyoming and to meet many new friends in the US, so it was about time to join an international forum, too. I'm looking forward to many interesting discussions here! Xaver

Hello, I am VINGOP, an amateur fossil collector (my hobby) and a teenager. On this website, I would like to help other people identify their fossils and get some help for organizing my collection. Also, I am learning to play the piano, one of my favorite hobbies.

I live in a reasonably moist air. It's definitely not tropical levels of humidity, but while I can keep my fossils in mostly airtight areas, I am still worried about them being affected by moistness, especially after reading this thread: https://www.thefossilforum.com/topic/136882-a-sad-day/ So, are there any fossils or replicas I should avoid which get destroyed by humid conditions? And, what would be the best way to preserve the fossils I do have or end up getting? I store most of the 'show-stopping' pieces in a display cabinet, and have a couple in storage.

Hello everyone this is my first post on the fossil forum.I’m 16 year old girl with autisum that loves fossils and I need help Identifying a fossil I got at a fossil/gemstone shop in South Dakota.I think it may be the rhino species Hyracodon.I also have a another fossil I got from the same place and I think it may be fossil horse or oredont tooth.So I would really appreciate it if someone can help me identify these.please and thank you.

Hi people, First of all, I love everything related to fossils and the fact of collecting them. I got these three Trilobite fossils from a reputable seller some time ago and I want to know if they're real or not. They presents cracks on the matrix that extends to the fossil I think. Here are some photos: Fossil 1: Fossil 2: Fossil 3: Thanks for your time and I hope you have a great week!

Hi everyone! It's great to be on the forum and I'm excited to be engaged and learning/sharing with you all. I'm from the UK and have many fond memories as a child, going to Scarborough and Whitby with my parents on holiday. I was always desperate to visit the fossil shops each time I went, even investing in a little fossil hunting kit at the advice of a friendly fossil shopkeeper. I never really found anything special, but I did find a few little pieces here and there at Whitby as a kid and it just made the trip so much more memorable. I'm now an adult and have been considering on and off for years to get back into the game on a more serious level, to start a new collection from scratch! My real name is Richard. I chose InvestableCards as a username as I collect and deal in trading cards under this name, particularly Pokemon. This has been a lifelong hobby - turned career for me. Coincidentally there was a set of Pokemon cards known as 'fossil', where some of the Pokemon (made up creatures) happened to be resembling dinosaurs. Anyway, that's a little about me. Again, I'm very happy to be here and I'm excited for the future now that I've decided to start collecting again!

Hello all. Newbie from Central ohio seeking to start a new expensive hobby =)

How an Amateur Collector Changed Paleontology Forever To those of The Fossil Forum, I wish to share with you the story of Maiasaura peeblesorum and Marion Brandvold, both good mothers. Maiasaura was discovered forty years ago in June of 1978; this is the month and year of the Maiasaura. Marion and her son, David Trexler, found fossils fascinating long before Jurassic Park popularized dinosaurs. They would often take a vehicle out and go prospecting in their backyard geologic formation known as the Two Medicine. One hot summer evening when walking back to the vehicle, Marion took a small detour and came upon some tiny fossilized bones. In 1937, the Trexlers had opened a rock and jewelry store, and over the years had created a successful jewelry manufacturing and wholesale business along with their ranching interest. However, Marion's heart was always with the land and the animals, and when her husband passed away, she opened a retail store for her merchandise rather than try to keep up with the wholesale business. That way, she still had time for the ranching and rock hunting that she loved. Marion and David had discovered a partial dinosaur in 1971, and they traveled the State of Montana to compare it to all the wonderful previous discoveries they had read about that had been made in Montana. To their surprise, the only dinosaur on display in the entire State was in a little museum in the basement of the high school in Ekalaka, Montana. It had been assembled by a couple of ranchers who had worked with paleontologists from elsewhere who had come to the State, collected, and left. Chagrined that nothing was left behind when professional work was done, they decided to start a small museum in the back of the family store. The goal was to display a dinosaur skeleton from their local area. After all, if ranchers from Ekalaka could do it, so could they. As far as professional training was concerned, Marion had to rely on her familiarity with the ecology of the modern world, as she had no formal education on the subject. However, a ranch foreman when she was young had taught her the art of tracking, and had shown her how each organism interacted with other organisms and its environment. So, when looking for fossil skeletons, Marion expected to see very young and very old animal pieces, but not much in-between. On the fateful evening mentioned previously, Marion, Dave, and Dave's wife, Laurie, were out collecting what they believed to be a fairly complete duckbilled dinosaur skeleton. It is a long, tedious job collecting all the bones present in a dinosaur, and they had uncovered 15 or so at that point. As tools were being put away, Marion went for a little walk, and when Dave and Laurie caught up with her, she was sitting on a small mound of dirt with a big smile on her face. She said, "look what I found!" She was holding several baby dinosaur vertebrae. Within a few minutes, they had found many more, and Dave had found a piece of a jaw with obviously duckbilled dinosaur teeth attached. However, the entire jaw section could be covered by a nickel! They had a baby dinosaur to go with their adult in the museum. Bill Clemens, a mammal paleontologist from Berkely, had stopped in Marion's shop on his way to dig on fossil fish with some colleagues, and was impressed with what had been done in creating a fossil museum without any formal training. At the fish site, he encouraged Jack Horner, then a fossil preparator at Princeton, and Jack's friend Bob Makela, a high school teacher from Rudyard, Montana, to stop at Marion's shop and see the displays. A few days later, Jack and Bob left the fish site and visited Marion's rock shop and museum. Jack introduced himself to Marion, and for the next few hours, they had a wonderful time going over the specimens Marion had on display. Jack then asked if she had anything else, and she showed him a couple of the vertebrae she had picked up from the baby site. Jack's interest was immediately piqued, and he asked if she had more. Marion directed him across the street to where Dave was reassembling the baby bones they had collected. Jack realized immediately that Marion and Dave had something they didn't understand. He asked, "do you know what you have here?", and Dave replied, "Obviously not, since you are so excited." The concept of babies and old animals dying and being preserved in the fossil record, it turned out, was only partially correct. While that cycle probably did occur, baby bones were generally not preserved in the fossil record. The bones Bob and Jack were staring at turned out to be the first baby dinosaur remains known from North America. Jack asked to be allowed to borrow the fossils in order to write them up in a formal publication. The bones were carefully wrapped and placed in a coffee can, and Jack transported them to Princeton. A visit to the site was also in order, and Marion and Dave took Jack and Bob out to the site. Dave also showed Jack a poorly preserved skull that Laurie had discovered, and Jack offered to try to remove it and clean it up for display in Marion's museum. However, after a few years and the specimen was recovered and prepared, it turned out to be the type skull for Maiasaura, and Laurie donated it to Museum of the Rockies, where Jack was working by then. Baby dinosaurs together in a nest past hatching showed a totally different picture of what dinosaurs were thought to be. Jack returned for many years, and eventually the Museum of the Rockies purchased the land where the babies were discovered. The area has become a mecca for paleontological research. The discovery of all this led to a massive shift in the view paleontologist and indeed science as a whole had for extinct animals and modern reptiles. A realization occurred that dinosaurs were truly living, breathing, majestic animals who cared for their young, much like the life we often see around us today. Hungry and thirsty, often looking for a mate, just trying to stay alive in an unforgiving world were the dinosaurs. Far from terrible lizards, they were much like animals and we humans are today. All this came from Marion’s tiny little find. It was her tiny find which led to a surge of interest and public attention. It was her tiny find which started Jack Horner’s career. It was her tiny find that indirectly caused Spielberg to help create Jurassic Park which in turn inspired many into paleontology and many more into other sciences. Those she indirectly inspired have contributed a near inconceivable amount to mankind through science. They range from medical researchers curing diseases, to those looking for extraterrestrial life, and all the way down to myself. A great many started their interest in the sciences with an early love of fossils and dinosaurs. A love Marion Branvold started and continues through her past contribution. Sadly, I never had the opportunity to meet her and she passed away in 2014, at the age of 102. Over the course of my short time in paleontology, I had the honor to stand where her tiny find was made. As the search for more discoveries continues I have been privileged to search with both Jack Horner and Dave Trexler. In the great quest for knowledge, she played her part well, now it is for us to carry on with the next act. What a massive contribution from an amateur and so tiny a find. As others ogle over the next major discovery, keep all this in mind and tell us more of your own tiny find. Eric P. Made with great assistance by David Trexler

Hello! I am brand new to fossil collecting and I look forward to making new friends and learning from this awesome forum!

Hello from northern California. Im an ameteur collector from my childhood and am getting back into the hobby. Mostly experienced with rock, gem, and fossil shows and shops in my area. Love going on beach hunts. Found a few fossil shark teeth last summer at capitola by accident so thats what got me back into the hobby!

We are planning a vacation in June to the Badlands area in South Dakota. I am wanting to do a fossil dig. Somewhere that is not expensive or and would like to keep what I find. Is this just a pipe dream? Where do I start? I am studying to be a middle and high school teacher in Kansas. I have always love fossils. I even have a T-Rex skeleton tattoo! I did contact the Badlands Park and they said you can keep up to 25 lbs as long as it is not a vertebrate. Please help! Thank you!

I have not run across many San Diego based fossil collectors who go out regularly. I am out 2-3 times a week and am always exploring new "legal" areas to potentially collect from. Besides the occasional trips to the desert, anyone know of San Diego based fossil organizations or people who are active field collectors?

I've met some paleontologists who insisted that we should not own any fossils as private collection. They claimed that all fossils no matter how common or rare even a Knightia or Elrathia trilobite should not be kept privately by anyone but instead goes to a museum for research and studies. Another reason they said is fossil collection gave rise to unlawful personals who destroys the site and shooting down scientists who enters the quarry for studies. Hence, any genuine fossil materials should be handed over to paleontologists for investigation and we should only own casts and replicas not the original. By buying a cast, the money will be funded for scientific researches and buying replicas is a way to support and not destroy science. So I personally wants to know from your opinions should we not own any genuine fossils despite they are relatively common?

Here is my recent display change. I was going for a "museum" look. Unfortunately with this display, I can only show the main pieces until I figure out a way to display everything else and have it all still match with what I have set up now. Until then, they are tucked away in their cabinets!