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I have been here at the forums for quite sometime now ( I think since I found my first fossils on a trip to Missouri close to 20 years ago?!) Work and life has been very busy and had prevented me from anything more than online hunting, you tube video's, and the lack of actual sites close to where I currently live. (Currently I live above the San Joaquin Valley, in a small mountain community named North Fork. I have had wonderful years here hunting arrow heads and various rocks and minerals, Have found many crystals at the old gold mine sites which are numerous over in Mariposa county next to me, and have had a great time up here! However, I took a trip to Missouri many moons ago to help a family member relocate out here to Nevada, which is when the unexpected happened. When we went to rent the moving truck to begin loading, my mom went inside to handle the rental, and as per my "norm" I took off walking across an open fields with, eyes to the ground,, towards the back of the lot and behind the row of trucks parked ready for rent, towards the railroad tracks. I was finding different minerals and such and then by chance I kicked over a plain down rudy clay looking rock, when I noticed it had a pattern to it. I looked closer and it was a plant fossil ! I was ecstatic, and thrilled does not even begin to cover it. I found several more all of different varieties when I began to notice what the 'commonalities' were with the ones I was finding. From that point on I was hooked! I made several trips back there just for the rock hunting and had found many wonderful 'treasures' which I cherished. I then began to explore more of Missouri to see what else there was to find in this state, and lets put it this way, the first thing on my bucket list is to return to Missouri!!! It got even better, after having my eyes opened so to speak as when we left there we headed to a ranch to spend the night that was owned by family back there. They have an 80 acre ranch. When we got there and I stepped out of the truck, I looked down and could NOT believe my eyes. There were fossils just laying around and exposed all up and down the dirt road which lead from the highway and into the 80 acres. I hunted for the rest of that evening and found more treasures. I have never forgotten that trip, and like I said I plan on gong back there one day before I die, and attempt to find more of those little treasures which made so darned happy so many years ago....and the family back there still owns the ranch too! I have since retired due to disability (heart) and find I have more time available than money naturally, so I am here to begin exploring what is available or close by where I live now, and also any near Fernley NV.. where I spend several months at at time there helping my Mom. I have small amounts of silver in quartz rock, (no gold yet though) many heads, awesome crystals, but my real desire is to find more fossils! So if anyone has any information or recommendations for me I would love to know about them! I am aware of the fossils found down in the Valley at the old landfill dump site in Madera, (wooly mammoth bones, sabre tooth tiger etc.) and I have heard of a dry creek bed somewhere down around the town of Dos Palos and of course Shark Hill and the Ernst Quarries and Ant Hill which is now closed. However its a vast area there, with miles and miles of open high desert area, which leads me to hope that those are not the ONLY areas where one can hunt for sharks teeth and other sea life fossils. Here's to hope! and forgive my long winded introduction but I am happy to be here once again and I'm looking forward to getting to know other members here. Thank you! Debra

I found this lovely piece near Las Vegas, Nevada. I’m no expert, but I’m thinking this is petrified wood. Looking for a more trustworthy opinion than my own. Thoughts?

I have a few trilobites from Nevada that are bugging me (pun intended). I just know that I have seen these before, but I can't remember or find what species they are. The first looks like some kind of Agnostid with spines off the pygidium. The second maybe a molted cephalon? Any idea of the species would be great!

Hi all, can anyone tell if this is a dolphin tooth, and what species it is? It's a gift from @JBMugu It comes from Sharktooth Hill of Bakerfield, California. Round Mountain Silt Member of the Temblor Formation. It measures 1.7 inches long. Could it be Kentriodon?

Newbie here. I found these two fossils in my backyard in Pahrump, Nevada. One appears to be a crinoid, but I don't know what the other one is. Is it even a fossil? This is the high desert area 65 miles west of Las Vegas. Can anyone help me please?

I found these near the Valley of Fire in Nevada. From what I've researched, the area used to be underwater from 500 million years ago to 250 million years ago. I presume these are ichnofossils of a burrow made by some animal (brachiopod)? The first photo is a burrow in situ. The second photo shows all three burrows. What do you guys think these are? - Seann

Looks like students of UNLV found bones of dinosaur which are now being studied by the Las Vegas Natural History Museum. The bones appear to be that of a hadrosaur and if named would be a first for Nevada News report attached and check out video in that report http://news3lv.com/news/local/new-dinosaur-species-discovered-in-valley-of-fire

Rare collection of fossils found in Southern Nevada will soon be on display, News3LV http://news3lv.com/news/local/rare-collection-of-fossils-found-in-southern-nevada-will-soon-be-on-display http://news3lv.com/news/local/gallery/rare-collection-of-fossils-found-in-southern-nevada-will-soon-be-on-display Yours, Paul H.

I’m wondering if anyone has experience preping stickleback fishes from a dolomite matrix. Obviously it is extremely soft and the preservation is decent but can literally be rubbed away with a breath. Will PVA stabilize dolomite or will it just melt at the introduction of any liquid? A friend gave me a piece to check out and I’d like to stabilize it. Any help appreciated. I can add pics tomorrow if needed. thanks Jeff

Wendel, J. (2017), Hunting rare fossils of the Ediacaran, Eos, 98, https://doi.org/10.1029/2017EO086601. Published on 13 November 2017. https://eos.org/features/hunting-rare-fossils-of-the-ediacaran https://eos.org/current-issues “The search for fossil imprints and casts of squishy organisms takes time, perseverance, and sometimes a sprinkle of luck.” Smith, E.F., Nelson, L.L., Tweedt, S.M., Zeng, H. and Workman, J.B., 2017, July. A cosmopolitan late Ediacaran biotic assemblage: new fossils from Nevada and Namibia support a global biostratigraphic link. In Proceedings of the Royal Society B (Vol. 284, No. 1858, p. 20170934). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/318379716_A_cosmopolitan_late_Ediacaran_biotic_assemblage_new_fossils_from_Nevada_and_Namibia_support_a_global_biostratigraphic_link https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Emily_Smith52 http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/284/1858/20170934 A related paper is: E.F. Smith L.L. Nelson M.A. Strange A.E. Eyster S.M. Rowland D.P. Schrag F.A. Macdonald, 2016, The end of the Ediacaran: Two new exceptionally preserved body fossil assemblages from Mount Dunfee, Nevada, USA Geology 44 (11):911-914. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1130/G38157.1 https://static1.squarespace.com/static/53cedb86e4b0710434ee1ff4/t/57fee4eef5e231fadeb000ee/1476322543557/Smith_2016_Geology_Dunfee.pdf https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/geology/article/44/11/911/195087/the-end-of-the-ediacaran-two-new-exceptionally Yours, Paul H.

The apparent demise of the best California, Utah and Nevada area paleontology website is premature. Inyo.coffeecup.com (created by a former TFF member) is up and running. Check out his great write ups with pictures about trips to many sites many now under protection by state and Federal governments. http://inyo.coffeecup.com/site/cf/carfieldtrip.html#fossilspages Download his fieldtrip guide: http://inyo.coffeecup.com/site/fieldtripbook.pdf Here are two of my favorites sites: Red Rock Canyon State Park in the California Mohave desert http://inyo.coffeecup.com/site/redrock/redrockfossils.html and see the magnificent silicified insects from the Miocene lake deposits near Barstow, CA http://inyo.coffeecup.com/site/barstowfossils/barstowfossils.html Thanks to TFF member @John for alerting us that his wonderful website was down. In a related matter, I would hate to see Inyo.coffeecup.com dissapear if the creator is incapacitated or runs out of money to support the site. Besides The Internet Archive AKA The Wayback Machine, I wonder if any institutions would be willing to archive a version for posterity. Books are archived in libraries; where should websites be saved? I wonder if The Fossil Forum would be willing to archeive copies of significant paleontology websites. Have we made plans to carry on and archive The Fossil Forum in case disaster strikes? Maybe geology libraries and paleontology departments at colleges/universities should store and archeive quality paleontological websites. Sometimes quality websites such as Mindat.org (minerals and occasion fossils) find institutions to preserve and support their continued operations. Mindat has Hudson Institute of Mineralogy, a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization. Has The Fossil Forum ever considered forming a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization to support our activities or finding an institution to partner with? As an added bonus donations to TFF would be tax deductable. Cheers, John

Here's an image I received the other day from a paleo-enthusiast acquaintance who with impressive regularity continues to pull interesting material for study out of his numerous digs in Nevada. Thought I might "get a kick out of it." I certainly did. The specimens come from the Lower Cambrian Harkless Formation of Nevada. Largest is about a quarter inch long (a little over 6mm). The back-story here is that they were rather confidently identified in the field as Salterella--an extinct member of the phylum Agmata, a phylum erected in 1977 by the late paleontologist Ellis L. Yochelson. They are of unestablished zoological affinity, which is to say that Agmatans cannot be definitely categorized with any modern organismal analog. What's especially fascinating about Salterella and its Agamatan Early Cambrian "cousin" Volborthella (which occurs in geologically older Early Cambrian strata, below Salterella's stratigraphic range) is that the Agmatan animal agglutinated minute mineral grains, incorporating them into its growing shell--that is to say, the actual soft-bodied creature who constructed the shells made a "conscious" decision about which specific minerals in its environment were best suited to include in its expanding shell-home. Back at home, though, identification dubiety set it. Now, he's not so certain. Thinks they could well be assigned to the extraordinarily rare Early Cambrian genus Lidaconus--which is not an Agmatan, apparently, though it bears a striking external superficial resemblance to Salterella--originally described from a couple of Nevada localities situated not too far from where these curious specimens were recovered. By the way--Just in case one speculates whether such specimens referred to Salterella, Volborthella, or Lidaconus could possibly be sclerites--in other words, the conical curiosities do not represent products of individual animals, but rather they're the dissociated components of a larger creature (fragmented "spikes" of some kind of "armored worm," for example)--that idea has already been proposed in the scientitic literature; and it's already been falsified, completely discredited. So, Salterella--or Lidaconus? Some uncertainly now exists, admittedly. Both Salterella and Lidaconus occur within the Bonnia–Olenellus trilobite Zone, in the upper part of the Harkless Formation. Lidaconus is slightly younger, stratigraphically speaking. The paleo-acquaintance also mentioned that he'd probably have to resort to cross-sectioning a few of the specimens; Salterella and Lidaconus can be distinguished on the basis of distinctive internal morphological differences. We'll see what transpires.

Hi all, I received this 2cm trilobite as a gift from a friend, who claims its from the Grass Valley, Lander County, Nevada. After a bit of reading, I'm fairly confident this means Nevada Limestone Formation. I can however only find references to Phacops, Proetus, Dalmanites and Phillipsia from this Formation..is this a Proetus sp? Help appreciated Marc

Yup. You read it correctly: Forbes article HERE. It was a monster, too. Enjoy.

Hi everyone, My girlfriend and I were hiking near Red Rock Canyon in Southern Nevada yesterday and came across an interesting pattern of pronounced ridges in the rock. My first thought was that they are fossilized water ripples, which have been found in the park. But on one edge the ripples stop in a very clear tapered line, which seems out of place for a shore line. I wish we had put something in the photos to get a better scale of the pattern but you can see my knee and foot in one picture. We got hooked on fossil hunting about a year ago would love to find out more about this pattern. Thank you very much for your help. -- Aaron

Here's one I ran across the other day, Simply put, this is one of the most aesthetically attractive fossil insects preserved on shale I have ever seen. A practically perfect specimen in superb condition. And excellently photographed by a museum technician. It's from what they're calling the Miocene Savage Canyon Formation, Nevada. Some quick research disclosed that, unfortunately, it's from a locality that is no longer accessible to the general public. Somebody more experienced with matters entomological will perhaps recognize just what exactly the bug is: R E L A X, folks--I fully understand that technically speaking it's not a true bug, of course. Looks dipteran, obviously. The photograph is from a web page over at http://calphotos.berkeley.edu/cgi/img_query?enlarge=0000+0000+1215+1242 .

Conotubus--my new latest favorite fossil. It's an Ediacaran (latest Neoproterozoic--AKA, Precambrian) tubular critter of unestablished zoological affinity (educated guesses include an annelid--specifically some kind of tube worm--or possibly a sea anemone-like animal). And it's been recovered from only two localities on Earth: southern Shaanxi Province, South China; and at one lone site in Nevada. Conotubus shows superficial similarity to the well known Ediacaran tube-type specimen Cloudina, but lacks a mineralized skeleton. Conotubus apparently secreted a tubular home enclosure composed of chitinous material. Image from HERE. Above, two views of the same pyritized (replaced at least partially by pyrite--an iron disulfide, of course, commonly called "fool's gold") Conotubus from the upper Precambrian Esmeralda Member of the upper Precambrian-lower Cambrian Deep Spring Formation, Nevada, where Conotubus occurs several feet below the first appearance of the ichnofossil Trepichnus pedum, which presently helps define (along with geochemical evidence-- a sudden, dramatic negative excursion of a specific carbon isotope) the worldwide base of the Cambrian Period, the transition from Ediacaran times to the earliest moments of the Paleozoic Era. Photograph is a Google Image grab, by the way. Image from HERE. Examples of pyritized Conotubus hemiannulatus from the Ediacaran, late Neoproterozoic Gaojiashan Lagerstätte of southern Shaanxi Province, South China. Photograph is a Google Image grab, by the way.

On occasion, a paleo-pen pal emails me a few images of unusual material (I would consider most of what's sent "unusual," anyhow) he's pulled out of various places. Latest example is in the photograph, below. It's a slab of shale from a lower Ordovician section of the Palmetto Formation, Nevada, that contains carapaces (original phosphatic shell substance preserved intact, by the way) of the curious, extinct, bi-valved phyllocarid crustacean called Caryocaris. The critter seems restricted worldwide to strata of early to mid Ordovician geologic age (a handful of examples assigned to the Silurian are apparently problematic)--sometimes occurring in "graptolitic shale facies." I'd never even heard of these things until I received this image. Had to do some research, indeed. Not something most folks see everyday, I'm thinking.

Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park is not your traditional museum, but it is home to Nevada’s state fossil, the ichthyosaur, so I thought I would write about it here. It’s in the middle of the state, far from any civilization. For years I had seen it marked on maps but I didn’t know anything about it. Since the word “Ichthyosaur” was prominent in the park’s name, I knew I would someday have to go there. So several years ago on my way to southern Utah for a week of photography, I took a detour to check it out. (You can read about the Utah part of my journey in several of my blog entries here but there is no mention of fossils in that part of the trip.) To get there from Reno, most people would take US Highway 50 to Nevada Route 361, then south to Nevada Route 844 and east to the park. This keeps you on paved roads for all but the last few miles to the park. But on these kinds of trips I subscribe to the axiom, “Never take an Interstate Highway when a 2-lane road is an option, and never take a 2-lane road when a dirt road will get you there.” So I decided to take US Highway 50 to Eastgate, then south on a dirt road to the ghost towns of Ione and Berlin, and then a couple more miles to the ichthyosaurs. When I reached Eastgate (not a town, just a private ranch off the side of the road), I shifted my SUV into four-wheel-drive mode and headed out. The dirt road portion is about a 30 mile drive down the middle of the Ione Valley. Don’t expect Google Maps to show you this route, you will need a good AAA paper map to find it. It was a bright summer day and I was the only one on the dirt road. The sagebrush was barely knee high, with clear views for 10 miles in all directions, framed by the Paradise Mountains to the west and the Shoshone Mountains to the east. It is the classic basin-and-range topography that sprawls across most of Nevada. Besides jackrabbits and coyotes, on occasion I would see the rare American pronghorn, often incorrectly called an antelope but really the last surviving member of an otherwise extinct artiodactyl family. To get to the ichthyosaurs you drive past the ghost town of Berlin, a remnant of the gold mining days of the late 1800s. The ichthyosaurs are in a quarry on the ground, protected by a building similar to the larger building at Dinosaur National Monument in Utah. The day I arrived I was the only visitor, and no one else showed up while I was there. I spent some time talking to the single ranger on site, a younger guy who had been there just a few months. He was promoted and transferred there to get experience in interpretation to round out the law enforcement experience of his previous assignment at a state recreation area. With only a few visitors a day (and some days in winter where there are none), he didn’t get a lot of opportunity. The ichthyosaurs are a late Triassic species called Shonisaurus, named after the nearby mountains. They are apparently the largest known species, with lengths up to 60 feet. A life-size sculpture on a wall near the building makes them look like giant Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons. There are several complete specimens embedded in the rock of the quarry together with numerous fragments (there are no mounted skeletons). It’s a rather small quarry with no excavations currently underway, and you can see it all within an hour. After touring the site I spent the night at the nearby campground, again the only one there. It was a dark night with an incredible view of the stars, accompanied by an occasional coyote serenade. If you go, do it for the total experience of the trip, not just the ichthyosaurs. Take time to explore the Berlin ghost town and spend a night camping out. Be sure to take all the supplies you need, as there are no towns nearby. Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park is a great place to get away from the rush of civilization and discover a bit of history and prehistory in a remote location. Ghost town of Berlin:

I usually do not buy fossils, but once in a while I see a deal, and can't resist. I won this auction of Cambrian trilobites. The only info on them is that they are from Pioche Nevada. Pioche Shale. There are 2 trilobites on the plate, not really well preserved, but ... I'm thinking one is Olenoides nevadensis. and the other may be Olenellus gilberti. Pictures are from the auction - sorry for the quality: Any thoughts are appreciated.

Hello! I live in Las Vegas and I love fossil hunting in Frenchman Mountain, the there are trilobites everywhere, I finaly found a full body trilobite there, can you guys I.D this one for me? I am pretty sure they are Olenellus nevadensis, because they are common in Nevada (who would have guessed that?) but I am far from an expert.

Found this rock that appears to be shale. It also seems to have a fossil in it. It was found in southern Nevada. What is it?

UNLV researchers puzzle over tracks left near Gold Butte that predate dinosaurs by Henry Brean, Las Vegas review-Journal. November 6, 2016 http://www.lasvegasnow.com/news/ancient-reptile-footprints-found-in-nevada/605337375 http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/science-and-technology/unlv-researchers-puzzle-over-tracks-left-near-gold-butte-predate Stephen Rowland In The News, University of Las Vegas https://www.liedinstitute.com/news/experts/in-the-news/83463 Desert Sands Freeze-Framed Dinosaur Tracks By Linda Faas, Mesquite Citizen Journal http://mesquitecitizen.com/viewnews.php?newsid=6772&id=16 Yours, Paul H. Triassic Gold Butte Clark county