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Added three new teeth in recent times to my collection of exotic meg teeth, I'd like to share since there,s not to many images from these localities out there, the photos maybe in shabby quality because I pulled them directly from my Instagram page to save time. 1) This partial tip of a meg was found in the Chiba prefecture of Japan! Acquiring this, even just a fragment was a real pain in the butt as megs from Japan are extremely scare. 2) Even though its not a Meg of course but still being the closest ancestor, this 3.1inch chubutensis tooth was found at a land site in Lecce, Italy with gorgeous color! 3) This tooth measuring 4.1 inches came from new site in Bangkalan City, Java, Indonesia. A majority of the megs here were found with absolutely terrible preservation so this one is one of the best out of the bunch! A few more pics of these teeth can be found on their posts on my page at https://www.instagram.com/nyislandfossils/ if its ok to post this here.

I have a coprolite that has me somewhat puzzled. It was found in a river in South Carolina and dates Miocene-Pliocene. I picked it up at the Tucson Gem Show because I thought it resembled some east coast coprolites with longitudinal striations/furrows/grooves that @MarcoSr posted a while back. Now that I've looked at it for a while and done a little prep work, I'm not so sure the grooves are sphincter related. There are intestinal muscle marks visible on one side, but they don't seem to match up with the grooves. The grooves were filled with sandstone/limestone. I left matrix in the deeper portions to preserve the integrity of the specimen. Across from the grooves are what look like puncture marks. My first thought was that they were clam borings. However, they do line up with the grooves in question. Now I'm wondering if these could be tooth marks as well. Under magnification, I noticed smaller tooth marks and an impression that I can't figure out. My imagination is now getting the best of me, and I'm seeing food chain activity. I'm seeing a big fish nabbing a small fish that was nabbing an invertebrate that was feasting on feces. Do you think the larger grooves and holes could be tooth marks? Does anyone have any idea what could have left the impression? The only thing I could think of is some sort of mollusk. Love your thoughts on this. @Carl

I posted this awhile ago, but today I prepped out the other claw that I always wanted to do but didnt cause its just a so-so crab. I had this for sale awhile ago also, didnt sell, but someday if and when it does sell someone will at least have both claws exsposed. Plus it gave me something to do today. Just love to prep even if its not the best crab. Still needs a bit more work. Someday? RB

I can confidently say that Brownie's Beach is my favorite site so far. I have only been to a handful of collecting locations, but I can already tell that this park is a gem. There are so many things to love about this site, from gorgeous scenery to great accessibility. I hadn't been hunting for about a month, and when you're new to this type of addictive hobby, that much time can begin to feel like withdrawal. So I can't tell you how excited I was to finally get back out there. As a side note, I'll try to keep my trip reports a little more brief. I've noticed that I'm practically writing an essay each time I post one of these. Anyway, once I saw that the forecast wasn't nasty, like it had been on the weekends for so long, I seized the opportunity and made my way out to the Cliffs once again. I got there very early, just before sunrise. I began collecting after snapping a few shots of the stunning scene over the bay, of course. The tides were not ideal, as it was just after high tide when I arrived, so I had quite a bit of trouble even making it past certain points. I may get some waders at some point, but I love my boots. With the high tides, I found myself transformed into a parkour master at times throughout the day. For the first few hours, I really wasn't finding too much. I was a bit discouraged because I had expected a couple decent finds for being the early bird. Turns out another TFF member had beat me to it. We crossed paths not too long after sunrise and shared the few finds we had so far. I forget his username, but I think his name was Phil. Later, we met again and showed out best finds so far; mine being a beautiful upper Hemi, and his being one of the biggest and most pristine Isurus teeth I've ever seen. It truly must've been nearly 3 inches in slant height. Apparently he had found it where I had already walked. Not to self: slow down the pace a bit. Later in the day, I began spotting some much better finds than earlier. The beach got busy near the entrance, but the Cliff base remained relatively calm. I ran into a good deal of other collectors, including another forum member, named Rob I believe, who was happy to show his finds and pictures of previous hauls. He's found loads of chubs at Brownie's, which gives me hope. I continued collecting along the Cliffs and near the entrance a bit, but the tide never really went out very far before it began to come back in. Because of this, I found myself hugging the cliffs along some stretches. This proved dangerous in multiple ways, one of which I learned the hard way. Twice. Walking right at the base of the Cliffs means you'll sometimes be stepping on extremely slippery, wet, clay-like material. Doing this, I fell two times. The first time, I feel on my bottom. But the second time, I stuck my hand out instinctively to break my fall. You know how there's a layer of broken shells protruding from the cliffs? Yeah, my hand went straight into that. If anything were to ever bite me at the Cliffs, I would think it'd be the sharks, not the shells! Another danger, and something I think we all should take very serious, was the cliffs falling. There were at least two places where there was a large tree hanging on for dear life on an overhang, directly over the beach. You could see the roots of the trees because the cliff under it had eroded and fallen. Very unstable and highly dangerous. The fallen logs along the beach are proof that the can and will fall. Point is, BE CAREFUL ALONG THE BASE OF THE CLIFFS, and keep your distance if you have the choice. I wrapped up the trip a bit early this time around, because the tide was high again and my body was aching from jumping from cliff fall mounds and rocks all day. Honestly, aside from the physical strain, this may have been my best trip yet. At least in terms of finds. It was definitely an enjoyable outing. My finds including a lot of the usual. Of the couple hundred teeth I found, the majority were small Lemons and Requiems. However, I also got many things that are a first for me. A couple large upper Hemis made me jump with joy because as you know they're my favorite. I found a cool broken Cosmopolitodus (Giant White) tooth, and a couple Cows, one that is actually pretty much complete! I found a lot of shark verts, which isn't typical, and my first fragments of dolphin verts too. I also managed my first ever crocodile tooth, which I am ecstatic with! Also got some Threshers and Hammerheads, as well as two complete Angel Shark teeth! Other than that, some decent ray plates and tigers round up my haul for the day. Thanks for reading. I tried to keep it short, but sometimes my enthusiasm just takes over and I want to share every little detail. As always, Hoppe hunting! (p.s. If either of the forum members I met read this, drop a reply so I can see your account names!)

found in miocene rocks, lacustrine environment.

Hi All, I've found 2 horse teeth in Hillsborough county, Florida that seem to be too small to be equus. The first one is badly damaged but I'm thinking it's a merrychippus species, the second I think is a nannippus species. Any help on identifying them would be greatly appreciated as well as any tips on better ways to ID them than staring at dozens of sketches of horse teeth.

Good morning folks, My name is Cliff dweller and I am new to the forum but not to fossils. This will be my 49th year collecting mostly Maryland Miocene fossils. I have followed the forum for sometime now and I am amazed by the topic range and knowledge found on the fossil forum. From time to time I find a specimen that I could definitely use help identifying. Yesterday I found this jaw that is 4 3/4"long 2" wide with 11 teeth. The specimen was fresh out of matrix from what I believe to be the Calvert formation zone 10. Enclosed are a couple of pics and would welcome any help from the forum. Thanks

I bought this jaw at a fossil show and the only info that came with it was "Badlands USA". The matrix looks Miocene Arikaree to me and not Oligocene but I'm not sure of course. Any information from a mammal/tooth collector will be appreciated. I have an idea of what it might be but I don't want to say anything until I hear from you all. Thanks, Mikey

I found this miocene fossil from Pohang, Korea. I think spots near the abdomen is Light organs. Is this order Stomiiformes? Size about 4cm

So dry season is making slough hunting possible again. These were 12-24" down in a now dry creek bed all within about 4 linear feet of each other. And I happily complied with the rules of fossil hunting and broke the big one trying to get it out.

Hello all, I recently visited Aurora Fossil Museum again, and I found this piece of a shark tooth. Now I am fully aware that making an id by a piece very well may be impossible. However, I also know that many of you are very knowledgeable. Here it is, take a stab at helping me identify it if you don’t mind. It has no serrations, so I know it’s not from the carcharocles line. The root is very conical.

No work today so decided to have some fun & at least cross this off my list. Being same age as Peace River/creeks (mid mio- possibly early plio) & hearing some hype about it, knew it couldn't be too shabby.. Very very shallow, like about a foot or 2 of water on average (most digging/sifting done on my knees). Surprising for a long creek. Seeing gravel on some of the banks, gut feeling I wouldn't have too hard a time finding rocks and indeed didn't for most of the spots I hit. Mostly smaller stuff, might be bigger gravel spots I'm sure, just no luck with it this time. But didn't mean I didn't find nothing noteworthy.. Early on found a unique vertebrae, looks like snake, surprised the delicate spiny processes were still intact. Mostly typical grey shark teeth from the time period (lemon, bull, tiger, snaggle) but I'm sure there's lamnids too in there. Eventually found my largest grey shark vertebrae to date, a whopper compared to my micro one in my trip to a phosphate mine! But still relatively small, almost the radius the size of a dime, bought one recently before today that dwarfs it, but still a great uncommon find in my book. Lots of trash, I suppose from decades of "good ol boys" being there, both large stuff along the banks and remnants dug up, exponentially more than Peace river & Joshua creek. But also more colorful shark teeth on average & some pretty rocks (threw back frags of red ones early on, thought it was man-made before finding more of them). Overall lighter colored rocks too than the area much farther south I'm use to digging up (fortunate I guess I live in central FL). Yeah felt like I found more than that, some holes provided more than others.. definitely felt on par with the Peace river overall, just not as scenic of course. Still, I'd go there again perhaps..

After a couple of weeks of us being under the weather from an Upper Respiratory Infection, Mrs.SA2 and I decided to take the dogs and visit one of our favorite places this past Saturday. Despite the forecast for rain, we both had a great day. But, the true measure of a successful day was achieved when the totally exhausted dogs slept the entire way home. As some of you may remember, I'm still playing catch up with Mrs.SA2 as she found 5 megalodon teeth in January. Saturday, I got my 2nd of 2018, about 10 mins after we started hunting. It's a gorgeous little "hubbell" meg with nice serrations and coloring. That gives us 7 megs so far in 2018. In just the few hours we were there, I found teeth from 11 different species of sharks. Here are a few of my larger ones. Mrs.SA2 had her own bag of goodies. I'll post some photos of them when she gets them cleaned up. Along with teeth, we also found a couple of those dreaded Miocene snails called Ecphora. Even more interesting, we found 2 different species of Ecphora about 10 feet from each other. I'm sure @Fossil-Hound and @sixgill pete can appreciate just how dreaded these Ecphora can be. Mrs.SA2 found 3 of them, but mine was the largest and most complete and is the oddball with only 3 whorls. Adding these 4 to her collection, Mrs.SA2 now has 59 Ecphora specimens from MD, VA and NC. The goal is to get around 100 specimens and then donate the collection for study and curation. All in all, it was a great day and Mrs.SA2 was happy. Happy wife, happy life!!!! Cheers, SA2 and Mrs.SA2

Hey everyone, After I collect a bunch of fossils from a trip, I sort them by species or genus. What I'm wondering is how you guys do this (if you do sort them). I've been using fossilguy.com so far, as well as this forum for when I can't find a match. Sometimes I'll look up a suspected species in a simple search, but my go-to right now is fossil guy. Although his site is really great overall, he really only covers the more common teeth found at the sites. So I have found his site to be very useful with identification, but I'd love a source that might go into more detail and cover more species. I want to hear what you all use to ID your finds (other than the forum). Keep in mind, the source would need to cover fossils from the exposures where I hunt. These include the Calvert Cliffs in Maryland, the Paleocene exposures near Purse State Park in Nanjemoy, and the Horsehead Cliffs in Montross, Virginia. As great as it is to have you guys identify finds of mine, I obviously can't do that for hundreds and hundreds of fossils, so I'd like another online source. It would be ideal if the source includes pictures and descriptions of how to distinguish finds from each other. Thanks in advance!

Here are a few Maryland horse teeth and other critters from mostly Brownies beach.

My fellow fossil-hunting partner in crime, @Chomper, and I hit Brownie's Beach around 10 a.m. on President's Day. I saw a bunch of other fossil hunters there, and I understand @WhodamanHD was there as well, though I didn't see him. (I had my nose rather close to the sand most of the time -- next time I go fossil hunting, must remember my glasses!) There was a fossil hunter there, a man wearing a Lowe's bib that he was using to put fossils in. I didn't catch his name, but he was amazingly helpful! I went up to him quite a few times with questions, which he kindly answered, plus he gave me tips on learning to spot fossils. He was especially helpful in showing the difference between bone and rock, and passed on two bone fragments he found. Once I started picking up the characteristics of bone, I started seeing them everywhere. I don't know if he's a member here, but I wanted to give him a salute and a HUGE thank you! All in all, Chomper and I spent about 5 hours there, slowly combing the beach. She's going to post her fossil finds sometime after this weekend. And without further ado, here are my finds! Please, please comment away on anything, especially IDing, as I tend to throw EVERYTHING in my pockets, fossil or no.

I have a minor medical procedure tomorrow morning. Nothing serious but it will keep me out of the Peace River for a week or so....So today I went hunting for the last opportunity before a layoff. Did I tell you that I am lucky? I have 4-5 hunting friends and when asked, they all claim that I must be one of the luckiest fossil hunters in the world.. You can judge. My friend Dave had found a Meg in a new location for him and suggested we go back to the same location today. When I got to this "new" location, I realize that I had dug this same spot extensively back in 2013-2014. However, the depth of the river in down from last moth and Dave indicated that he had found deep gravel with lots of hemis, tigers, duskys, lemons and a few Megs.. Sounds interesting , We really had a workout expanding the hole down and out. I was in waist deep water to start and shoulder deep water at the end of the day. Lots of small teeth, plus , horse and chunks of Mastodon, Mammoth, and ivory...Dave was finding similar fossils plus a number of nice small Megs. Nothing unique Until. Dave thought this might be tusk because of the obvious layering. I am not positive, but If it is not tusk, there are few sources of 4-6 inch canines in the Peace River watershed. Let's see what Bobby think for this find. @Boesse I could not be more pleased. ANY identification yields a super rare fossil, even one that is broken in half. As we paddled back to the bridge, Dave indicated (half_humorously I hope) that he may not be taking me to his new locations in the future.

Hey all, This isn't so much a Fossil ID as it is a question. Can Tiger Shark teeth have smooth cutting edges if they're worn down enough? If so, then this tooth would certainly attest to that. I'm fairly certain that it came from the jaws of Physogaleus contortus (technically not a Tiger, but I call it one anyway). The strange thing is that it almost entirely lacks a defining feature of Tiger Shark teeth: serrations! The only evidence of a serrated edge are on the distal shoulder, but even there they are incredibly worn down. On the blade of the crown itself, the cutting edge is perfectly smooth, like a Hammerhead tooth. My question here is not if teeth can be worn down, because I know this. Some are so worn that they become unidentifiable! My question, rather, is why is the rest of this tooth hardly worn down at all while the serrations are doing a disappearing act? Do serrations on fossilized sharks teeth erode faster than the rest of the tooth? Thanks in advance for any help.

As my whale family is nearly complete now I went looking for other marine tetrapods. (and big fish by the way). I had for some time included Thalassocnus, the unbelievable swimming sloth of Miocene Peru in my to do list. Really fourlegged tetrapods are quite a lot of work compared with the highly reduced whales, so I was glad when I realized that the Megaterium made by geoworld was more or less my scale when seen as a big Thalassocnus of 3.3 meters. It finally arrived the day before yesterday, and today I spent some hours making it look more seagoing. I lengthened the snout, smoothed the skull and jaw. sawed out the intercostal spaces and made the limbones less bulky. The spinal processes are pointing more backwards now. (or at least their edges are) I am positively surprised how well this cheap model turned out after only few hours of work. Aloha J

Got in a few hours of digging today and popped a few keepers out. One day I'm going to find a nice complete Meg that size.