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I have several good Eldredgeops rana specimens from Penn Dixie Fossil Park, and they were fairly clean when I hacked them out. Unfortunately, there is a lot of shale stubbornly stuck in the groves and crevasses of the trilobites. I have access to a dental sandblaster, but I'm not sure if it's safe to use. Any thoughts?

Hey everyone, I had an entire free afternoon yesterday so made my way out to DSR and Briggs rd. I haven’t been out there since the group hunt and I was curious to see if I could find pickings to split. I did a good amount of slab tossing and I know others did as well. People also got some newer areas going also and I was curious if I could work off those too. I started the day at Briggs rd because I did so well last time I was there. I was drooling for a 2nd shot! I didn’t find anything top shelf worthy but I did seem to stumble on more dipleura than I did the last couple visits. These are the total spoils from Briggs rd. I don’t know how common dipleura is at Briggs or if they ever come complete but these are my best dipleura so far from Briggs rd. They sure don’t show up like the Eldredgeops lol. I just liked this cephalon lol. All alone popping out it the rock with great detail!! Basically I got a bunch of stuff like this. I did a ton of labor moving over burden so that perhaps in the future I can keep expanding the shelf I started. Kinda rough on the back but this overburden doesn’t remove itself! After a few hours I moved onto DSR to see what was left behind for me to find . With all the action at DSR with the group hunt something was bound to get missed!! I forgot to take pictures of the site when I was at DSR so all I have are the final spoils and some close ups of my favorite finds. DSR spoils I wasn’t at DSR as long cause I was so tired and worn out from Briggs rd so I didn’t do much slab removal or excavating. I spent most my time scouring over others discard piles looking for hidden gems! And gems I did find!!! I found this dipleura looking through some blocks that were pulled off the upper layer of the quarry. Dipleura tends to show up more in the upper strata. It’s missing the pygidium and the cephalon is tucked over. With some minor prep I should be able to expose the rest of the cephalon. Super happy about this find. In general I have been coming up empty with dipleura at both Briggs rd and DSR so it was a bonus. Last but not least....... Echinocaris punctata phyllocarid!!!! I found this just sitting out in the open face up. Most likely mistaken for a bivalve. I couldn’t believe it. My best phyllocarid carapace so far. It’s nearly perfect!!! I have to say this beats all my other finds for the day. Just sitting face up for me to find . Well that wraps it up. Fun time at Briggs rd and DSR with a couple exciting finds for me. Seems like every time I go out I comeback with something totally unexpected!! It just keeps me coming back for more . Hope everyone has a great mother’s day! Thanks for reading, Al

Hey everyone! I am about to be on a business trip for the next week so I made sure to try out a new location this past weekend. I went fossil hunting on Saturday and Sunday. Both days! I doubt I’ll get to do a double header like that for a while. Once summer hits I’ll have to figure out a way to fit in all these outdoor activities lol. I went to DSR to play for a little on Saturday morning. I only had until 11:30am to hunt, I had to help wedding planning with the fiancé. I only stayed at DSR for a little and gave myself enough time to go to Briggs rd for a first time hunt. Ive never been to Briggs rd but I’ve seen some trips posted by Dave @Darktooth and the location was very close to DSR. It was a site I was told to visit if I wanted to find Eldredgeops. Greenops are the more common trilobite at DSR and Eldredgeops is the more common trilobite at Briggs rd. I must say...very interesting site. Not very “pretty” as far as roadside quarries go, but she’s a beauty I tell ya haha. I’ll follow with pictures of Saturday’s DSR and Briggs rd finds after the text. I took my nephew out fossil hunting on Sunday cause he’s been pretty aware of my activities lately lol. I took him, my sister and brother in law to DSR and Briggs rd on Sunday. I went to the diamond mine last year with my nephew and we didn’t do so hot so I needed him to take home something this time! We sure my nephew Dylan went home with some nice trilobite material. I gave him a nice folded over greenops from DSR and my brother in law found a killer Eldredgeops at Briggs rd. So Dylan was a happy kid with some nice fossils. Ok time to show pictures. Trying to find a way to streamline this process lol. First Saturday’s take homes

I have up for offer this little fella. He's not perfect, but he's a cute little ~2cm prone Eldredgeops rana with a nice little coral in association. He's got something weird going on on the right portion of his cephalon into the first few pleurae, but has really nice color and a great personality. I prepped him out to a degree, but I don't want to risk losing any more of his already damaged glabella. I'm offering him up in trade for another equally disrupted trilobite. Message me with any interest!

Great day overall found all of these plus a triple with 2 eldredgeops and 1 greenops which I gave to Devoniandigger to prepp

It’s been quite some time since my last post here on the forum – more than two years! I missed the forum and it’s good to be back. This last week was spring break for some colleges in Pennsylvania, mine included. Thursday we saw beautiful sunny weather, warm enough to shed the heavy winter coats we’ve been wearing for months. Checking weather forecasts, I was pleased to find that Friday would be similarly warm – sunny and mid sixties to seventies! Perfect fossiling weather! I seized the opportunity. I knew these unseasonably warm temps could be gone as soon as they had arrived and didn’t want to miss a chance like this. I drove out with my little brother to a couple of sites I’d visited before. The first was an Ordovician roadcut. I’d been told the rock here was from the Salona formation, but Coburn formation limestone is also known from the area and apparently has similar fossils so I’m not entirely certain on this site’s stratigraphy. After about an hour’s drive we arrived at the site – only to be greeted by two nasty pieces of roadkill at the base of the cut! Agh! Thankfully they weren’t near the collecting area and didn’t have a noticeable odor yet. We immediately set to work, crawling carefully up the gentle slope of the cut and checking each irregular chunk of tan limestone. It didn’t take me long to score several fine Cryptolithus trilobites, as well as some neat mushroom-shaped bryozoan colonies and a handful of brachiopods. The trilobites here are usually found with either the horseshoe shaped ventral side or the noselike glabella poking out of the surface of the stone. They will take some prep work to expose fully – I’m hopeful at least one or two of them are complete under all that stone. Most of them are just isolated cephalons or chunks of Cryptolithus collar. After about 45 minutes on the cut we took a break for lunch, stashing our finds in the trunk. Our sandwiches finished, we walked back out for round two! Scrambling over fallen stone, I managed to score two big blocks with multiple trilobites each. The crown jewel was a block with at least 15 Cryptolithus showing! I probably won’t even attempt prepping that one until I’m a little more confident in my abilities. I’d hate to ruin such a great multi-block of trilobites. After another hour or two at the cut, we’d found enough. Some of our finds: Bryozoans: More trilobites: Brachiopods: Continued in next post…

Today was a cold one here in Central New York. I wasn't really planning on doing much today but then I got the fossil itch. I decided to take a quick trip to Briggs Road and try my luck at some trilos. Got to the site around 3:15 pm. On the ride out I saw remnants of snow that probably came down the night before. There wasnt much, but that's not a good sign this early in the season. Anyways when I got there I could see that someone else had been out there recently and had opened up a couple spots. I immediately got to work and was surprised how many partials I was finding. Now I have to mention that I don't keep to many partials unless they are big, well defined, or I think more is hiding in the matrix. But then some whole ones appeared. The first was a roller still imbedded in matrix. I broke it out and lost some thorax in the process. The next was a nice big one which was not in a ideal location for retrieval. It broke into many pieces and then I was very sad. Then the 3rd time was the charm. A nice semi-prone with tail tucked under popped of the matrix as nice as could be. I was glad to get out there as it could very well be the last time for awhile. The road is seasonal use and will close November 1st. But I will still have Deep Springs and Cole Hill until the snow comes down too much.

I have finally got a chance to get back to do a hunt, in the Devonian of New York. It seems like it has been forever since the last time I hunted for trilos. Aleast a month or two I think? Today I went out with only my youngest child Devin. We only stayed for 2 hours, but this trip certainly got the blood flowing. I went back to Briggs road and hit up the same spot that I have been working on all year. I have to say I am getting very excited buy the size of the specimens that I found today. First thing I found was a Eldredgeops cephalon laying on the ground. Doesn't sound very impressive does it? Well the fact that it measured 4 cm or 1 1/2 inches wide should. Most whole trilos barely reach that size! I found other bigger, then normal partials with a few possible whole ones. The size really gives me an idea that there may be some bigger bugs hiding there than what I had previouly thought. I also found a large partial Greenops Cephalon and partial Greenops thorax and pygidium. Plus two Dipleura cephalons unfortunately they all ended up crumbling from just the short time they sat in the sun. I should of gotten them to the car sooner. Here are pics of just what I brought home. A lot of partials were left behind.

The high axial lobe of this pygidium reminds me of the Greenops. Should I put it in that collection camp ? Also, he has a little hitchiker riding piggyback. I assume it is an Eldredgeops that's been a bit distorted. Or is it something different ? Cheers,

You know I am very fortunate to be able to collect in a lot of special places and with a lot of great fossil friends. Over the years I have had the good fortune to meet many of you and even prep a few fossils for some of you that are patient enough and brave enough to trust your gem to what is for the first time a stranger. Arkona, Bowmanville , Brechin, Ridgemount are all special places that I collect....... but equally special is New York States very own Penn Dixie Fossil Park. A real gem. Now some of you might think that Penn Dixie is not for the serious collector ......... but you would be dead wrong. Just ask a few of our Forum Members that came away with exquisite and mighty rare Bellcartwrightia from there last season. I was fortunate to be able to prep a few of them . I even found one earlier this season myself but alas as my post on the forum showed it turned out to be a less than stellar partial but none the less the only one in my collection. Well I was at Penn twice in the last week and a half, once to get in Jay's (Devonian Digger) way as he was getting the area ready for the upcoming "Dig With The Experts". Both times I went with Greg from the forum here. He is my designated driver it seems so far this year.......(Dave you may have been replaced).. You see I have this phobia and cannot drive over large bridges. Well anyway back to the story....... Since I spent so much time helping Jay (getting in his way) on the Friday I needed to go back this Sunday to actually look seriously for some fossils. Kane from the forum as you can see from his posts was there later on the Friday afternoon just as we were finishing up with the excavator. For some reason only my cart and saw ended up in any of his pictures. I The Friday was a reasonable day as I came away with about 15 complete eldredgeops and a so so bug that will be either a greenops or a bellacartwrightia once I get around to prepping it. Greg and I had a pretty good day on this past Sunday. I came away with probably 20 to 25 complete trilobites and Greg seemed to have a fair amount in his bucket but only asked me to cut out one large prone Eldredgeops for him. Anyway on to the topic at hand . ... Since greenops and bella's at Penn seem to occur in clusters On Sunday I went to the area I found the greenops on the Friday and I found what looked to be a promising Greenops. Both were in the first inch of the Smoke Creek (no Jay I will not tell you exactly where). For those of you going to "The Dig WIth The Experts" there is plenty of this material that has been piled up for you in an area that is off limits till the 19th of May. Jay and I did take a walk about the piles and we can see that the material for this year'd dig looks to be excellent. We both saw complete trilobites, brachs and cepholapods waiting to be removed from the rock. I must say we were both very good and made sure that no one (especially Kane) collected from the out of bounds area. So here is the promising Greenops that I found on Sunday as collected, prior to any preparation. I did not get a picture in the field but as is typical of how I collect ( I am an excavator) it was in a 200 plus pound slab that I removed from a bench that I was excavating. Don't look like much.... obviously the eye is less than perfect........ but looks can be deceiving.. Here it is again after a couple minutes of prep... After 1/2 hour it is actually starting to look like a fossil albeit a compressed , twisted and somewhat deformed one... but that gives it character Prep is being done on a COMCO MB1000 at about 50 PSI using 40 micron dolomite. using .015, .018, .025 and .030 Comco nozzles . All work is being done under an Olympus zoom scope at 7x to about 20x magnification Scribe work on this bug is with a British Sealy for the rough work an American ARO for general work and a German Pferd MST31 for the fine work. A real mishmash of nationalities.... Progress continues... At this point definitely thinking that it is a greenops (not a bella) and that it has some potential even though I can see it has eye problems But what is this... is that another bug I see coming into view.... could it be a 2nd Greenops... that had been completely hidden We like hidden bugs as they have the greatest potential to be pristine... nice genal spine poking out of the matrix... probably means the whole cephalon is there Definitely looking like there might be two (which I believe is pretty rare for Penn Dixie).... We find lots of pygidiums but rarely multiple complete greenops on the same plate... Anyway fingers crossed at this point... After a bit more prep work...actually a lot more........ OH No !!!!!!!!!! the second one is inverted ... what a shame.. But what is that under the first greenops.... Oh my goodness its an enrolled large Edgredgeops......... Wait a minute ..... What an I thinking.... no reason to be upset,,,,,I can fix that ..... who says an inverted trilobite has to stay inverted.... Lets just do some prep magic and see what happens.... As you can see the second greenops was flipped in the same location on the matrix. Absolutely pristine killer eyes..... So here is the plate as it currently stands. I still need to make a level base for it once I decide exactly what orientation that I want to present it in. I need to do a final clean at high magnification with a .010 nozzle and low 15 PSI to get the last bits off and remove any abrasive that is still there (the white stuff) Total prep time about 6 hours. I also need to decide if I want to repair the broken right genal spine on the attacking bug and its left eye. I am thinking yes for the genal spine as that is an easy repair as either a mold of another bug's spine or a part from a spare cephalon if I can find a size match(always take home cephalons of greenops that have genal spines you never know when you will need one) Let me know what you think I should do in the way of repair/ restoration. I am thinking a restored genal spince will definately enhance the overall look of the piece I absolutely love this plate and it is staying in my personal collection.To me these are natures work of art. I am calling it "Attack of the Killer Greenie's". When you sit staring at a bug under a scope for many hours doing prep you have lots of time to think. In my wild and crazy imagination I can see this pack of Devonian raptors swooping in on the big fat Phacops ... a moment in time , captured forever. Actually this would just be the random way they ended up postmortem......but it sure is neat to speculate.... Again from a slightly different angle.... I would say that if you can find specimens like this at Penn Dixie it is well worth the trip. (Well I think so anyway) As I understand there are still a few spot available for the Sunday of the Dig With The Experts Weekend. I had hoped to be there helping out with my trusty saw and limited advice ......but as you would have know it my wife scheduled my daughters birthday celebration for the Saturday... So not this year...... Here are a few extra angles... Note that there is a partial greenops or Bella pygidium under the Eldredgeops..... Should I have continued looking......... Naw a some point you have to say it is good to go..

This might be a job for @piranha This trilobit looks a little different to me than the typical Eldredgeops. Maybe Dechenella lucasensis? I didn't realize how poor the photo quality was until I cropped it. I can take more photos under the scope if necessary. Silica Shale, middle Devonian (Givetian), Paulding, Ohio. Scale in cm/mm. This one seemed different as well.

Today I took a trip to a much underrated fossil site, Briggs Road, in Earlville New York. For those who don't know Briggs is only a couple miles North from the much talked about Deep Springs site. I had been wanting to get back to the trilo layer here as this is a great spot for Eldredgeops rana But this road is a seasonal use road so when it snows they only plow until the last house before the site and leave a big pile of snow blocking the road. Finally after a few days of warmth the snow pile was gone. The rock here is quite weathered right now and all I used was a small pry bar to help break off pieces from the main wall. My older son David had rehearsal for an upcoming play at school. So only Dylan and Devin were with me. Me and Dylan did the most searching while Devin was just being a boy. Throwing rocks and ice into the small pond that formed in the quarry was his thing today. We found tons of cephalons and pygidiums. I found a nice almost complete prone trilo in the rubble pile that I thought was whole. I was very sad when I saw that most of the left side was gone. I did find one small complete roller in matrix and a few that may be wholebut will require prep to fi d out for sure. Dylan seemed pretty content as he found more trilo parts then he ever has before. We stayed for about 3 hours. I wanted to stay longer but I promised them we would only be there a couple hours and I didn't want to push it. Here is some of our finds.

All I can say to this fine specimen is "Wow!" @Malcolmt thank you so much for restoring and preparing this prone Eldredgeops rana. Here is a before and after.

Devonian, Mahantango fm., Eastern WV. (average size thumb) Not much here to go on. I barely saw the edge of it so I dug it out ... just to see that it went nowhere. By comparing photos, it looks like a single pleura from an eldredgeops trilobite. Am I close ? If it is, its the first one I've seen here among quite a number of cephalons and pygidia. Been very busy with work, hope to get a chance to look around a bit toward the weekend. Cheers.

Hi group, I think this is another greenops pygidium. If it is, this make a Trilo-Trio, all three species found within inches of one another. The Eldredgeops was peeking out of a natural fracture and looked like it might possibly be more than just a cephalon ..... but, no luck. Only had about ten minutes to look today, hope to get a chance to look more tomorrow. Devonian, Mahantango from eastern WV. Kind regards.

Hi folks, just back from vacation. Realizing more what to look for, I found 5 more pygidia today as well as this little beauty which was in a piece of shale beside the road at the end of my driveway. I picked it up on my way back from the mailbox as it looked promising. This is trilobite (bit) #15 and replaces #7 as my new favorite. I really dig those eyes ! Just one eye was exposed and there was plenty of matrix there to contain the entire trilobite, but sadly after taking great care (and time) to scratch down to the body, there was only a cephalon. I was so hoping this was a complete one. Will keep looking, and hoping. Thanks for looking, Cheers.

@DevonianDigger found this beauty before @Kane could get to it! @Kaneworked hard to dig this slab out but @DevonianDigger cracked the slab open before he could! Hence the new phrase (after his name) is: You've been Jayed! @DevonianDigger didn't even know it was from his pile. What a find!

I just spent the past few days digging up some neat Devonian-era fossils from the Penn Dixie Hamburg, New York site and have two Greenops and 10 Eldredgeops that need prepped. Would anyone out there be willing to prepare these fossils for either a fee or for some of the spoils? I have a lot of high quality Eldredgeops, cephalopods, bryozoans, and crinoids that I could give up in exchange for the fossil preparations. I also have a bunch of shark teeth from Calvert Cliffs along with some neat shells (Turitella and Ecphora). Send me a personal message if you're up to the task or respond if you have any referrals.