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What better way to celebrate the end of the year than with a little fossil hunting? And the hunt ended with some spectacular stromatolites; read on! ----- When I got an itch to hit the field last month, I reached out to a quarry in Perrysburg, Ohio to collect fossil and mineralogical samples for donation to academic institutions. The quarry was kind enough to grant me permission to collect on their property for several hours in late December, so when the time came, I suited up and headed out with a trusty assistant. The quarry exposed outcrops of the Lockport and Greenfield Dolomites separated by a thin lens of shale. We were permitted to collect from the outsides of the berm piles surrounding the walls, but I wasn't sure what to expect, as dolomites often exhibit poor fossil preservation, and I had never hunted these units before. Even so, we eagerly hit the berm piles with rock hammers in hand. The quarry wall. The Greenfield Dolomite (red line) sits on top of the Lockport Dolomite (blue arrow), which extends to much deeper than the shelf upon which the photo was taken. The shale horizon between them can be clearly seen as a dark line. Almost immediately, I found a small brachiopod, but then it was several more minutes before we found other fossils. We proceeded to find a variety of reef-building organisms. A small brachiopod (1) and . . . the underside of a Favositid coral (2)? A friend suggested that the larger of these two fossils (3) is a Favositid coral. I'm not sure about the smaller one (4); maybe a bryozoan? This find (5) confused me: it looked like a concretion, seemed to be covered in iron oxide, and had an odd, striped/fluted pattern inside. A friend suggested that it could be slickenslides. It was the only rock that I saw that looked anything like this, and it really stood out against the dolomite. The best finds of the day, however, were undoubtedly the stromatolites. The quarry exhibited them in abundance, and they were readily found throughout the berm piles. The rounded tops of a group of stromatolites. The mottled top of a stromatolite. More layers can be seen just above the left side of the rock hammer. Check out this stromatolite (6)! The coin on it is an American penny. It came from a stromatolite that seemed to be at least 60 or 70 cm in diameter. Not only did we find fossils, however; we also found several crystals, as the dolomites were scattered throughout with crystal-containing vugs. Here's the largest crystal that we found. I haven't tested it with acid, but I suspect that it's calcite. We collected a few other crystals too and even saw some purple ones hiding in a seam in a large boulder. Unfortunately, someone beat me in discovering stromatolites here by many decades, so I didn't make an groundbreaking discoveries, but the trip was nevertheless a wonderful way to round out the year, and all of these samples will end up in academic institutions. May you all have even better fossil hunts in the new year! Cheers, Elasmohunter

On a recent trip to Lockport, NY, I found some fossils that I would like help identifying. For those familiar with Lockport, these were found in an outcropping of sedimentary strata along a walkway down stairs from the Pine St. bridge over the Erie Canal locks, leading to the Erie Canal museum. At first glance, I though these might be crinoid stem sections, but on closer examination they don't have any internal structure. I'm not sure if they could be worm tubes, coral, or something else. At 25X magnification, the matrix appears polycrystalline, and I'm guessing it may be some type of sandstone. Thanks.

Hi All, I'm new here and honestly have only a small working knowledge of Geology and fossils but I'm interested in learning. I live in and interesting area I think, Western New York. Lockport, NY to be specific and along the upper portion of the Niagara Escarpment, I have to be at least 3/4 of the way up the rise of the escarpment, I can see to Lake Ontario from my property. In this area around me, stone wall used to be a big thing and they run through the woods for miles sometimes, build back in the 1800s after the Erie Canal and marked property lines and I assume was also a good way of clearing the rock from the fields. These rocks around me that are a softer more layered rock are just loaded with fossils but mostly small shells and what looks like some small crinoid type pieces. I have been studying up and trying to research what rock I predominantly here and I think I've narrowed it down. I would just like some input on what you believe this predominant rock type is, what these shells would be, age, and what else you think could be found in these rocks if I spent significantly more time breaking open lol. I will attach an imagine of approx. where these rocks are (blue dot circled in red) and the corresponding layer that this would be. If I've narrowed this down accurately, this would be the Lower Silurian (Sik) and possibly be "Irondiquoit Limestone, Rockway Dolostone, Hickory Corners Limestone, Neahga Shale, Kodak Sandstone" I will then try to add some pictures of this stone/rock type and the shells i found and cleaned some in vinegar. really appreciate your input and knowledge on what rock this really is, what the fossils are and age range so I can research what else might be able to be found in these rocks.

I found these two trilobites in an old collection and need some help. They are both labeled as Silurian from Glenridge Quarry at St Catharines, Ontario. They are listed as Gasport Formation. Before anyone gets too upset, they were collected pre 1991 as that is the date it was cataloged. So when these were collected, the site was either an active quarry or a garbage dump and not the park it is today. The first trilobite is obviously a Calymene. If anyone knows the species that would be appreciated. The second trilobite is what has be stumped. No clue as to what it is. It is just labeled as unknown with the locality information. Any clue out there??? Joe