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Dave's Down To Earth Rock Shop and Prehistoric Life Museum
Nimravis posted a topic in A Trip to the Museum
Today I took a quick ride to the small suburb of Evanston, right out side of Chicago. This is the home of Dave's Down To Earth Rock Shop and Prehistoric Life Museum. If memory serves me correct, Dave's has been in Evanston for the past 40+ years and it is a family owned business. Dave's recently moved to it's new home on Main Street and if you every get a chance to be in the Chicago area, this is a must see- you will definitely not be disappointed. From the outside, you would not believe that this store has a museum that houses such a great variety of fossil life and the most extensive collection / variety of Mazon Creek fauna that I have ever seen, including 3 Holotype Mazon Creek fossils named after Dave and his parents who found them. Here are some overview pictures of the Museum. Here are some overview of the various displays.- 47 replies
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Decided to go for a hunt yesterday after my Saturday plans were canceled due to two flat tires. The weather report had it as a cold day to start with an expected warm up y midday. When I got to the river at a little before 8:00 am the temperature was 40* F with a light breeze. Got the kayak set to go then donned my wetsuit with a jacket style life preserver over it to block the wind. Even then I also put on a hooded sweatshirt and gloves for the paddle to my hunting site. As I approached the area I planned to search for the day I stopped to take a few photos of the sun rising over the river. The gravel bed I was targeting has been producing some nice fossils. The negative, it stays in the shade most of the day due to overhanging trees along the banks. The river is not really wide at the spot. I shed the sweatshirt as I entered the water and decided I would need to try and keep my upper body as dry as possible due to the water/air temp and the breezy conditions. I think this was a big part of why there were no outstanding finds for the day - couldn't dig as deep as I would have liked. Usually the deeper I go the better the results. Finds for the first few hours were limited to a variety of shark teeth. Some were quite nice but most were small and regular finds. I was also finding a lot of turtle shell. The first interesting thing that came up was a piece of a turtle plastron followed by a ray barb and a small puffer fish mouth plate. Then a partial meg appeared in the screen and I was managing to forget the cold and my numbing fingers. It was getting to be about 12:00 pm and I had been digging for 3 1/2 hours when I really started to feel the cold and decided to take a break to warm up. I had to climb out onto the bank and walk downstream to find a spot where the sun was breaking through the trees. I took off my life jacket, dive boots and socks and hung out in the sun for about 20 minutes to try and warm up. I felt I had warmed up enough to get back to work and with the next screen I came up with what I believe is a cetacean vert - second one found at this spot. As I wasn't coming up with any other great finds I decided the cold and the river had worn me out for the day. After pulling up an armadillo osteoderm I packed it in at about 1:30 pm. I usually stay until at least 3 pm. I think the cold had gotten to me as when I left I neglected to remove my knife from my hip and later found that I had inadvertently pierced the inflatable seat in the kayak - thankfully I didn't jab the kayak! Below are some pictures of the days finds. First some turtle pieces and the vert - Next photo Left side - Cup of misc. shark teeth, Armadillo Osteoderm, Ray barb, Puffer fish mouth plate, Tiger Shark, Extinct tiger shark and lemon shark. Right side - Turtle Plastron, Sand shark, partial Megalodon & Hemis. An overall average day on the river with a bit of a chill in the air! Today I need to patch the seat, lol.
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A bad morning in big brook is better than a good morning almost anywhere else. And a good morning is..... bunch of shark teeth, shark vert, an unidentified vert, deer leg, rib fragment and atlas vertebrae (who decapitated my Bambi?). A good size belemnite and a pice of pottery
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Tentatively putting feelers out there for the possibility of trading for a Cooksonia plant fossil and/or rhynie chert plant fossil material. I may be up for considering other plant material, but those are the main two I'm after. I have a little bit of everything except for invertebrates or dinosaur material (though I do have a little bit of fossil plant material from the Jurassic), so feel free to shoot me a pm and we can discuss things further. Thanks!
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I found these fossils in Sepins, Coimbra, in Lower Jurassic stages, maybe Toarcian (but i'm not sure). Can you give me specific ID's? -Ammonites: -Really nice ammonite: