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Like the title says... it's a bit on the crammed agenda for only two days. But not if you don't sleep. lol! Old people don't need all that much sleep anyway, so I've found out. Tuesday the 2nd of April I was up in the foothills above Salt Lake City checking out the Anasibirites Bed in the Triassic Thaynes Formation. Wednesday, I'm packing up my camera gear for a session of astrophotography in The Last Chance Desert between Green River and Salina, Utah. Not only is Utah full fossils, it's also renowned for it's beautiful dark skies at night...but only way out in the desert. We have light pollution like anywhere else in the urban environment and just an hour or two we have Bortle Class 1 dark skies. The scale goes from 1 to 9, 9 being like Tokyo and1 being in a desert, ocean or unpopulated, unlit location. Fishing, Astrophotography and Fossils are my big three personal interests among many others. Wife and family are always first but balance in ones life is also a good thing. Enough rambling. Packed the gear for fossils and stars, food, drink, personal safety gear, eye drops ( gotta have it in a dusty desert ) gassed up the Element and I'm off. Never gets boring scenery. Heading over the summit pass @ 7500 feet. First stop was a previous site, Garley Canyon, which was barely thawing the ice and snow with plenty of mud. This time it was dry and I turned in to look for the orange outcrops containing ammonites. Had to visit one of my favorite cacti - Scelerocactus vivipara - the small flowered fishhook cactus. This is an exemplary specimen. Usually BLM land have so many open range cattle that they get squished before growing up. I drove around looking for those orange mounds of possibilities. All the way to the cliff. Not sure what this was besides guessing and worth a photo. Nice, HUGE, slab of inchnofossils, which I left in place. I drove around and did not quite hit the spots where the orange outcropping were to be found. The website I researched had been posted back in 2009 and with time the jeep trails were much rougher and washed away. I also had a timeline to catch a museum before its closure at 4 pm. This canyon and the orange outcroppings weren't going anywhere and miles to go before I don't sleep this night. Second stop is a rockhound mecca. Septarianville also known as the Dragon Egg Nest. Supposedly the only location with red interior septarian nodules. The more common variants are yellowish calcite interiors. We have a nice yellow one and my wife gave the green light for a nice red one to go with it. Here's the turnoff sign. I go down the gravel road a few miles and spot the sign...hmmm.. the sign is a little worse for wear than the online pic and the site is deserted. No tents, no big excavator, no tourists/visitors. I called the number - no answer. The web says open until 8 pm. I'll be following up on this later. They probably have a summer season only. IDK. The site courtesy the big eye in the sky. What the red ones look like. There is online a blogger's site where he drove one mile past this site to find large ammonites in concretions weathered out of the hills nearby. So I find said hills and start checking out the likely spots. It's a dead end road with hills...I couldn't miss it. And I didn't. However there are a lot of hills, ravines, climbing and hiking around and the concretions are few a far between. In fact, I'm not seeing any at all. So on to the next hill. Ahhh! I see a few which have been hammered open. The usual suspects inside. Bivalves, gastropods and some evidence of small ammos. I checked every broken concretion carefully, as I had found at other sites that more than a few keeper fossils were overlooked. Not this time. Just lots of crumbled concretions with many being calcite veined only and Inoceramus bivalves along with gastropods were all I found. Where were the reputed "large ammonites" ?!? Here's a sample of the few concretions found. In the center of this piece I noticed a olive shaped smooth fossil shell. With a little, lite taps I and put this & another into my empty bucket. I believe I found samples of Birgella subglobosa or B. burchi. Not sure. Daylight was waning and I had 50 miles to get deeper into the desert for the evening under the stars. Along the hike back to my car. I noticed a few surface finds of trace fossils. I collected the first one. The sun set in the west as it does and in the east a celestial phenomena occurred; The Belt of Venus appeared. It only lasts a short while so my image captures were spontaneous cell shots out of the window as I drove. On to the desert astrophotography destination. An early evening image before the Milky Way rose in the wee hours between 2 and 5 AM. Jupiter, Orion the Hunter and the Pleiades are heading south for the summer. And the Milky Way season is ON! A rare mud puddle added some interest in the reflection of the stars. A short nap between 12 and 2 and then between 230 and 5 I captured many images of the Milky Way galaxy. Afterwards, another short nap and back to the fossil hunting. First stop, the Castle Dale museum, second stop the Jurassic National Monument, third stop meeting new friends and sharing the excitement of finding amazing ammonites. I also have an interest in ancient American pottery and craft replicas of this type of pottery using locally found clay, slips, organic and mineral paints, primitive tools and outdoor firing techniques used by those original potters. This specimen is from the same location where I collected mine late last year on one of my earliest fossil hunts. And I'm going to post this now to not overload the thread with MB's of images. Next up is the Jurassic National Monument and a few pics of the ammonites found after visiting the Cleveland-Lloyd dinosaur quarry. Steve

Continuing with the teaser title... What does it mean when you find a partial ammonite outer whorl of these dimensions? 10 cm X 15 cm. 1 - I'm gonna need a bigger vehicle 2 - Just a lucky fluke 3 - Get back out there and find its siblings 4 - It's a fake plaster cast with which someone spiked the site 5 - These aren't the Ammonites you're looking for, move along 6 - Pay no attention to the peanut butter M&,M's nor the Reese's cups, I'm still celebrating!!! So I'm 3 fossil hunting trips behind and I had a 48 hour binge including two of said trips and one Astrophotography session with Orion Pleiades and Jupiter from 9 pm to 12 am; interject a 2 hour nap, then a 3 hr session with the Milky Way from 230 am to 5 am when the crescent moon rose and ended the session. Then another 2 hr nap when my wife texted me awake from home while I was snoozing comfortably in the back of my Honda Element in The Last Chance Desert. Then jump back into the fossil hunting saddle, a museum visit, plus Jurassic National Monument and more. Oh and not to forget that famous Clawson, UT UFO Landing Site. I gotta lotta catching up to do. This partial is an adult Prionocyclus macombi sp., the gracile form . I will attempt to estimate the possible diameter ASAP. Steve

I’m not even sure if looking at these or posting these would help. Most teeth from Shark tooth ridge are broken so I feel ID is hopeless. But if anyone knows anything , id be forever thankful! A. I’m really curious what these thick ones are. They don’t scream Squalicorax sp. B. Doesn’t look like a shark C. Scapanorhynchus sp. D. I really love the color on these. E. Also is a cool color pattern F. Too broken? G. This is what most of the teeth look like. It’s so sad. but I would keep going back if I could

Unusual fossil which we belive to be a fish snout. We had at 1st thought potentially ptersoaur but seems more likely to be fish. We have also had the suggestion of a weathered turtle skull.The last picture is a confirmed partial ptersoaur bone we also found today.Found in NW Queensland in the Toolebuc formation which is early Cretaceous marine deposits. Has anyone seen something like this before?

Hello there! They came from Maevarano formation, Berivotra, Madagascar. Can you help me? Thank you. Is it really？

Hello there! It came from Maevarano formation, Berivotra, Madagascar. I have never seen teeth in this shape before in this place. Can you help me? Thank you. Is it Simosuchus?(It is a collection of my friend.)

So I am 90 percent convinced the site is Austin Chalk Formation. I have found a couple of fossils that lead me to that conclusion, a gastropod and a nautiloid specifically. That being said, I cannot quite figure out what these bacultes are. From the HGMS book the Boehmoceras arculus seems to be the closest but it says it is a curved shaft, which these most certainly are not. But the strong nodes on these are really not falling under any other possibility. Any insights? 3.5 inches 2 inches 1.5 inches this is the only one that you can really see the suture patterns. The nodes don't show up very well but they are there

I recently recovered this Cameleolopha bellaplicata valve from the Upper Cretaceous (Middle Turonian) Prionocyclus hyatti ammonite zone of the Carlile Shale here in New Mexico. I was initially delighted with its preservation and upon further inspection, noticed a feature on the inside of the valve... ...I thought it may be a blister pearl. I reached out to Dr. Spencer Lucas (New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science) to get his thoughts. His response was: "years ago, we found a Texigryphaea near Tucumcari with a similar pearl in it." Pleased with that response I turned to the interwebs for more information. V. Friedman and A. Hunt (2004) wrote and abstract on Fossil Pearls from the Upper Cretaceous of Texas in which they are reporting Cenomanian and Turonian occurrences...I plan to reach out to Adrian Hunt to get his thoughts on this specimen as well. I also found a paywalled paper on Fossil Pearl-growths written by R. Bullen Newton (1908) in the Journal of Molluscan Studies and have requested access to that literature. Then I turned to our Forum. @LanceH found a pearl in the Kamp Ranch Limestone... ...as did @Mikrogeophagus ... ... @Bobby Rico has a blister pearl specimen from the Norfolk Coast (UK)... ...and @rocket is working on some Campanian Ostrea semiplana pearls from Hannover, Germany. There are numerous threads here on the forum where fossil pearls are discussed. These conversations, along with some modern representation from interweb imagery... ...have led me down an unfamiliar path. My understanding is that these fossils are uncommon. And with all that said, I pose this question... ...is this a fossil blister pearl? I would love to hear your thoughts. Thank you for your time.

Can anyone help identifying these specimens? They were found in marine Cretaceous sediment in eastern Alabama. If they are bivalve, I could not locate the bottom halves.

The Theropod Dinosaurs of the genus Allosaurus since their discovery in 1877 are perhaps one the most recognizable theropods of the whole Jurassic period (201.4 ± 0.2-145.0 Million Years ago) despite emerging only in the late Kimmeridgian stage of the Jurassic period. Growing up to 9.7 meters (32 feet) in length fully grown, Allosaurus (also known as the Lions of Jurassic) were the apex predators of most of the terrestrial ecosystems they inhabited. The only theropods from these time that were higher in the food chain were some European non-Allosauroid Theropods and other members of Allosauroidea including the much rarer Epanterias (validity debated, possibly grew fully grown up to 12 meters (40 feet) in length) and Saurophaganax (validity confirmed, fully grown reached 10.5 meters (34 feet) in length). Digital Reconstruction of an adult Allosaurus sp. By artist Frederic Wierum Image Source: https://fredthedinosaurman.artstation.com/projects/Qg0WB The Allosauroids eventually gave rise to some of the largest theropod dinosaurs known in the fossil record currently including the closely related South American genus Giganotosaurus from the Cenomanian stage of the Late Cretaceous period (99.6-95 Million Years ago) in what is now Argentina (which fully grown grew up to 12-13 meters (39-43 feet) in length). But Allosaurus itself has largely been considered to have lived only in the latest stages in Jurassic period (155-145 Million Years ago). I have found some records that might challenge this assumption!!! Digital Reconstruction of an adult Allosaurus sp. By artist Frederic Wierum Image Source: https://fredthedinosaurman.artstation.com/projects/Qg0WB

I just returned from a few days up in NJ where I had time to visit Big Brook (and Ramanessin for a little bit too). I went for a couple hours last Wednesday when I first arrived, then picked up where I left off Thursday morning. It was pretty chilly. About 28 degrees when I first woke up at 7. So I did some other work at the Colt's Neck Inn Hotel (highly recommend) until about 11. Over that time it warmed up almost 10 degrees. But I headed out. The positive to the cold weather was that I was the only one out there. It was also sunny despite the cold, and was otherwise a great day to go out. About 2pm and nearly to the Boundary Rd bridge, sifting through pile after pile of gravel, this beauty rolled across my sifting pan and I could hardly believe it. After a good 5 years and several trips, I finally found my first mosasaurus tooth! It's a bit beaten up and chipped, but I couldn't have been happier. Totally worth my beet red hands. This was my big trip maker and will have an honored place in my special fossil cabinet.

We got a donation at work of a lot of little finds from post oak creek Texas. I’m not familiar with the site at all and the labels for these appear to have gotten wet some time in the past. I looked at the book on Cretaceous sharks and rays of Texas and it made me more and more confused. Would love any help to get these relabeled. If not, they’ll sit for a decade, be thrown out or given away here are my really unsure ideas- 1. Texatrygon sp. or ptychodus sp. 2. Pseudocorax sp. 3. Not enough there ? 4. Not enough there ? 5. Goblin ? 6. Carcharias sp. 7. Carcharias sp. 8. Carcharias sp. 9. Not positive enough to guess 10. Carcharias sp. 11. Hybodus sp. 12. Not enough there ? 13. Ptychodus sp. 14. Too broken ? 15. Ptychodus sp. 16. Too broken ? 17. Fish tooth? 18. Enchodus tooth 19. Drum tooth? Not a vert. The bottom is flat and shiny 20. Small fish tooth 21. Slag? Super shiny in person 22. Stumped here. Bone? Coprolite? Straight shelled cephalopod? Just rocks ?

A little over a week ago I flew to Memphis and then drove down to Tupelo, Mississippi to spend two days collecting at the nearby Blue Springs fossil site, Upper Cretaceous, Ripley Formation, Coon Creek Member. It was my fourth trip there in the past two years. Weather was decent- 65 degrees the first day, 55 the second., a mix of sun and clouds both days. The site was very mucky the first day there, but it dried up for the most part by the second. The first time I visited there, the surface collecting was excellent. Not so much the last three times and this time was exceptionally poor. So, as you can see from the photo, I did a lot of digging. The softer material near the top did have fossils, but normally they crumpled as soon as they were exposed. One particular small nautiloid that was original shell material and mostly gold color was especially heart breaking. As I dug deeper, more intact fossils appeared in the now tougher marl, mostly mollusks with at least some shell material though much of it came off when the rock split.