Search the Community
Showing results for tags 'moah'.
-
Hello all. I picked up this fossil in a Permian formation on the Potash Road, unpaved section, SW of Moab. I think I can eliminate what it is not but am unsure of what it is. I do not think it is some kind of sponge. It does seem to have the structure of coral. It does not it seem to be like any bryozoan clusters I’ve seen. If that is correct, this begins to narrow it to bacterial. The fossil material is very thin overlaying a hard red clay base, so I don’t think it is a stromatolite. It does not come in layers, but seems to be just one layer. The piece is 4cm x 4cm x 4cm. The fingers in the third picture give a good sense of scale. The most distinctive feature is the tooth like ridge just to the left of the red dot in the first picture. The second picture shows the thinness of the fossil level and the other pictures show the roughness of the surface. I wonder if it might be an algae mat of some sort. I looked at posts on the forum dealing with algae mats and similar and find things loosely similar but not conclusive to my untrained eyes. If it is an algae mat, it may be a fossilized cyanobacterial piece. At this point I’d like help just putting it into the broad category of what it is, which will direct further research. More pictures available if anyone wants. If you have ideas, thanks for sharing. And if they come with some reference source, even better. Thanks. Tom