Search the Community

Here is another “forest floor” opal and this one has an opalised fungus, I believe. Here is a video of it and I attached some microscopic stills. What do you think? Is this one a fungus?

Greetings. Location: Southern Washington State, in the Cascade Range, by a river. Geologic studies of the area suggest there was a massive landslide at this location over 1 million years ago. Present day it is a very wet area with lots of fungi. Material density and hardness appear identical to the petrified wood found at the same spot (highest concentration of petrified wood I've come across in the Cascade Range. I first thought it was wood until I noticed the direction of the lines seem to be perpendicular to how I'd expect tree rings to be. Reminds me of some sort of shelf mushroom, though I do understand any sort of petrified/fossilized fungus is extremely rare and unlikely. I look forward to your input.

Fossilized mushrooms come up from time to time on the ID forum and I was wondering what fossil fungi are known. Let me know if I'm leaving any significant examples out. Fungal rot in petrified wood: Polyporites wardii Fungus trapped in amber: Parasitic fungus erupting from an ant in amber: Mushroom in shale: Rhynie chert microfossils (and similar microfossils at Gray in TN): Prototaxites, the giant (30') tree-like fungus of the ordovicadian:

While I am out in the badlands of the San Juan Basin, I keep an eye out for the trace fossil known as Asthenopodichnium...lozenge shaped overlapping pouches or cavities found in petrified wood. My first encounter with it was a number of years ago in an outcrop of Upper Cretaceous Menefee Formation. I threw a chunk of wood, with this very interesting texture, in my bag and took it home. Perplexed by what it might be, I showed it to Spencer Lucas at the New Mexico Museum of Natural History. He was happy to see this specimen and we discussed the theories of what it might represent, as it is not fully understood. We wrote up a small abstract with a few other co-authors for a Geologic Society meeting and since then, I have looked for other specimens while wandering. In 2015, some specimens found in the Upper Cretaceous Kirtland Formation of the San Juan Basin were published in the NMMNHS' Bulletin 67 and are the first published record of these trace fossils in the Kirtland. The following is a link to that paper. The trace fossil Asthenopodichnium from the Upper Cretaceous of the San Juan Basin, New Mexico On a recent adventure, with @Opuntia, in the Kirtland Formation of the San Juan Basin I stumbled upon these... ...and was delighted. I couldn't wait, and texted the photos to Spencer. His response was "collect it!" In later conversations he asked where the specimens were and we discussed their location, a potential small paper and started planning a return trip to document them. Excited, I sat pondering the fossils and referred back to the paper. As I looked at the field photo in the paper I noticed a rock in the frame...I had seen that rock. I compared my field photos to the publication's and realized that I was looking at the same locality. Publication field photo: PFOOLEY's field photo: This left me feeling a bit deflated as there would be no need for collection nor a small paper. I began to think back to the time, all those years ago, when I first encountered this trace fossil in the Menefee...I'm going back there and can hopefully relocate that site...might just have a small paper in store after all. I post this here to see if any of you have seen this trace or maybe just some thoughts on this fascinating fossil. Got Asthenopodichnium?

My backyard find, a few miles north west of Long Beach. I found the smaller pieces (which appear to be mushroom, then hit a large rock, removed the rock and saw a corner of this sticking out. Still working on cleaning it with a soft brush as it is VERY fragile!

Hi All, This specimen is from a pile of tumbled rocks, no provenance. My best is guess that is Rhynie chert with sections of silicified fungus or early plants. However, it might just look similar. No clear cellular structures are visible. The circles are 13 and 4 mm in diameter. An expert opinion would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Hello everyone, I'm new to this forum, but I always lurked here without an account and learned a lot, so I made one to become part of the community since I collect and study fossils as a hobby. Now for the piece mentioned on the title, would you be able to help me figure what kind of fossil (or even if its one) is this? The structure reminds me of some fungus, like a polypore, but I cant figure what kind it is or if its an igneous rock or some kind of wood. I know some bracket fungus when dry can become really hard. Unfortunaly I dont have the item in my hands right now, as its from an auction that I won and I'm still going to retrieve it from the owner. All he knows is that it came from an american geologist collection in California and that it is really really old. It has 19 cm, not sure about the weigh tho. Thanks!

Hey, everyone. I found this a few years back and thought how strange it would be for a mushroom to achieve fossilization, so I kept it as a sort of trophy on my desk until losing track of it during a move to a different city and then forgetting all about it. I found it again earlier today, however, and was once again struck by how unlikely a mushroom fossil was, especially one not embedded in amber or stone. After some investigation, the odds seem even greater that it can't be. Nevertheless, the gills seem undeniable to me, and it's as light as you'd imagine a fossilized mushroom would be. I figured I'd bring the mystery to people who would enjoy solving it, so here we are. Thoughts? Did the cosmic mycelia arrange a discovery too synchronous to allow the possibility of a cold and empty universe devoid of meaning? Or am I just some jerk with a rock? In case it matters, this was found in central Texas some time in late 2016. Unfortunately, I can't recall the exact moment of discovery right now. It was either in the hill country near New Braunfels or along a hike and bike trail in North Austin.

I found this in my Seattle area yard, near the dead stump of a small maple. After washing and bleaching the septums appear filled with sand and shell bits. There is also something growing throughout it like a veinous system—likely plant? It is heavy. There are striated and mineralized layers. There is a ventricle feature and a faceted stem—it’s disturbingly brain-like. I feel honored to have finally guessed my way through your captcha (respect!)~~hoping someone can identify this oddity. Best guesses so far are coral or fungus, but I’ve not found any examples sporting this stem canal...

Good evening to everyone, I am really very new to fossils and petrified items so I am at a loss as to what I may have and I need your help. My grandfather left me this piece when he passed away a few months ago and it was marked "Petrified Mushroom". I have included some photos for your review and if you have any questions please let me know. The mushroom, for lack of a better word, is about 22" long by 14" deep by about 3/8" in height. It weighs just about 74 grams and has a spot in the middle that looks like wood, it looks like it was cut or removed from a piece of wood maybe a tree. Any help anyone could provide would be extremely appreciated. If this is the wrong forum to ask about my item I deeply apologize, just let me know and I will remove the post right away. Thank you again and I hope everyone has a great week.

Ok guys please bear with me, I am new here. I first have to say this is a great forum. I ran a forum for over a year on a specific species of Central American Cichlid, and surely I wish it was this well put together. Many kudo's for your hard work here. Where shall I begin... A friend of mine claimed he had this petrified mushroom. He said he was walking through the farm fields after a fresh till looking for arrow heads that he commonly finds. He claims he kicked this rock and noticed something strange about it so he brought it home and washed it off. He said it was plain as day what he had...a fossilized or petrified mushroom. I'm no expert in the field Paleobotany or anything to do with fossils, but it just seemed odd to me that such a thing could be turned to stone like this. I had a hard time believing him and finally tonight he brought it over. Sure enough, clear as can be it is indeed rock hard mushroom. The top of the cap is completely smooth and the bottom of the cap has a hole where the stem should be as well as lines where the gils of the mushrooms are. There is also a stem that he says was in the hole in the ground that the cap came flying out of. I took some pictures with my cell phone and they are horrible. I am going to post them anyway just to give a slight glimpse at what we are dealing with here. For people like us its a pretty exciting find, but it leaves a couple of questions: How can something so soft stay in such perfect condition through such an extremely long proccess of fossilization? One would suspect a fungus would decompose before this could happen. Are fossils of mushrooms common? How can we determine the age? The other thing that sort of puzzled us was the location this thing was found. It was not found in rock. Delaware has practically no rock...we are mostly sand here. So does southern Delaware seem like an unlikely place to have found such a thing? I know these pictures wont do it much justice or give you much to go on for identification purposes, but I atleast wanted to show something so you knew this story is not a fabrication. Thanks in advance for any help you may be able to give. Cole~