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Hi there! I just found this forum while searching for information on Cervalces scotti fossils, and it looked like a really neat forum, so I wanted to join! I hail from north-central Oklahoma, and I've been a bit of a fossil fiend since I was a little kiddo. I had wanted to become a paleontologist once upon a time, but life had different ideas. Nowadays I'm a farm foreman and a freelance artist with lots of hobbies. Somewhere in my totes I have a couple trilobite fossils and an ammonite fossil I traded for a long time ago. I recently found some crinoid stem fossils near my creek, as well as a teeny-tiny piece of some sort of leg fossil, and it has quickly reignited my love for fossil-finding. I was curious about stag-moose since I seem to be in the southern range for them and, as you can probably tell by my username, I'm a bit obsessed with all things cervine. Megaloceros giganteus is my favorite prehistoric deer but stag-moose are pretty cool too! It would be an absolute dream to find something from a stag-moose one day. Anyway, nice to meet you and I hope to see you all around! -drowsy

Fossil here is in devonian age strata of Oklahoma, I did not think there were many lobsters and stuff, could this just be geological

Is there enough here to identify? I'm thinking maybe oreo, it is from Oklahoma Oligocene

I would like to share a beautiful and possibly important crinoid in my collection from the Pennsylvanian Holdenville Formation of Oklahoma, USA. This specimen is best identified as Plaxocrinus sp. aff. P. dornickensis as originally described by Harrell Strimple in his 1961 paper "Late Desmoinesian crinoid faunule from Oklahoma", and confirmed by Pennsylvanian crinoid expert Peter Holterhoff. It was prepared masterfully by Mike Meacher. It is a member of the family "Pirasocrinidae", which is a prevalent group of crinoids especially in the Pennsylvanian. They are characterized by a low, saucer-shaped cup with three anal plates, axillary first primibrachials and various spinosity on the arms, and most notably a prominent highly-specialized "umbrella-like" anal sac that terminates as a platform of plates surrounded by a circlet of laterally-projecting spines. Aside from simply wanting to show off one of my favorite fossils, there are a couple of reasons I think sharing this publicly could be useful. First off, articulated pirasocrinids are generally very rare in the fossil record, especially of this genus. It is thought that these crinoids had weak sutures between plates which made them highly-vulnerable to disarticulation. The vast majority of remains are found as loose anal/brachial spines and occasional calyxes, as shown below. https://snr.unl.edu/data/geologysoils/fossils/nebrinverthughes.aspx Likely because of this, formal descriptions and pictures of pirasocrinid crowns are scarce in the literature and it is difficult to find public references on what articulated specimens look like, especially of how the spines of the arms and anal sac are configured. Though on my specimen the arms are not 100% complete all-around, enough is preserved to describe the full structure of the arms and the nature of the spinose primibrachials. Moreover, the exceptionally-preserved and prepared anal sac shows nearly the full extent of its articulation. Note the couple of near-complete brachial and anal sac spines, whose extraordinary lengths exceed the width of the calyx. The second reason this specimen could be important is more specific. In Strimple 1961, Plaxocrinus sp. aff. P. dornickensis was described on just a single specimen; the calyx shown below: Atypically for the genus, this calyx has a very smooth outline owing to flat, non-bulbous basals and nonimpressed, almost imperceptible sutures. Strimple concluded this species to be closely-related to but not conspecific with true Plaxocrinus dornickensis (which is a slightly older species than the Holdenville fauna, according to Dr. Holterhoff); hence the "aff." in the identification. Essentially, as far as formal description in the literature is concerned, the full crown of this crinoid is unknown. I have also not personally seen any other confirmed crowns of this species from the Holdenville Formation. All-in-all, this specimen could be quite significant for showing the previously-unknown arms and anal sac of Plaxocrinus sp. aff. P. dornickensis on an articulated crown, which might help further its description.

Hello, I recently found several concentrations of large animal bones above a small creek in central Oklahoma. There are at least four different clusterings of bones, all within about 50-100 yards of the creek length, and each spot contains what appears to be bones from multiple large mammals (cow size) ranging from leg bones to ribs to vertebrae to partial skulls and jaws. None of the bones appear to be particularly recent, and some are pretty degraded (skulls that are easy to break apart, cracked teeth). This location is also along the Chisholm Trail that ran N-S through Oklahoma in the mid-late 1800s. I haven't found any tools or weapons of any kind in the area, and haven't noticed any obvious markings on bones that might indicate butchering, hunting, etc. One skull recovered so far (not included in the pics below) has been confidently ID'd as an elk based on the presence of two lacrimal ducts in the front of the eye orbits. I was wondering if anyone is able to give an ID on any of the additional bones below with some level of confidence. I hope it is okay to include all of these pics in a single post (apologies if not and I can repost individually). Here is the most intact skull I have found, it is 24 cm across at its widest point: Here are lower jaw bones recovered so far. From what I have read online, it seems like the orientation of the mandibular notch is more like a cow than a bison, but the M3 teeth seem to be on the large side for a cow (upper 30s to a little over 40mm): Here are two closeups of the M3 tooth from the single jawbone in the picture above: A femur that is ca. 12.5-13cm wide at the condylar end: Last but not least, here are some pretty weathered upper teeth: Thanks again if anyone has the time and inclination to offer insight on any of these finds. Maybe they are just cow through and through, but I thought I would check just in case.

Found this at Skiatook lake in Oklahoma for a day trip. I’ve had the darnedest time figuring out what time period it could be from or what type of clam. I think it looks a lot like a modern day giant ocean clam, and comparing it to all the clam and shell type fossils I can find in encyclopedias and online none look quite like this. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Ahead of my trip to the Arbuckle Hills area of Oklahoma, I had tried to find sites that may produce a Crinoid Lobolith for me. My finds in the field did not support the likelihood of success. However, back home, I discovered I had thrown this round object into my baggie full of fossils. Initially geode or bryozoa or coral seemed likely. But after looking at it in combination with some other site finds made me HOPE for a Lobolith from a Scyphocrinites. I will let you be the judge of my identification for I am completely novice to such a fossil. If any other views are warranted, just let me know. I forgot the ruler! The specimen is 3.5cm by 3.5cm by 2.5cm. There is strong mineralization as seen in this photo To the top of the picture, it appears as if a crinoid stem could have exited here. The "bottom" of the specimen is missing Close up photo shows some crinoidal pieces This is a drawing of what I hope I found At the collection site, I did find what appears to be a crinoid holdfast. So the two fit the photo above!!! Details verifying a crinoid holdfast are missing. But this specimen has the same mineral coating as the crinoid columnar pictured below. @Ironhead42 posted these photos of a crinoid lobolith found in the general area of my find. I feel they look similar. Thanks for any info/ identification!

After posting my trip report last week, these two partial ammonites pictured are without identification yet. Can anyone give me a suggestion as to their identity? They were beach finds on the Oklahoma side of the lake.

Posts of my trip to Oklahoma this week had some unidentified fossils shown. Hope was that someone would mention the identity of the specimens. Since no one did, today I am attaching photos of unknowns from the Viola Formation, Ordovician found south of Sulphur, OK. Maybe @crinus is knowledgeable! Could they be something like Evactinopora?

Oklahoma 3 So far on my excursions around Oklahoma I have been greeted by goats and elk. The start of day 3 had me face to face with something I hadn’t anticipated! And it wasn’t another Oklahoma gate. No, it was a dazzle (what a herd of Zebras are termed) from the genus Equus. As I exited my vehicle, this particular Zebra was snorting. Thank goodness when Zebras snort, it is a sign of contentment. Zebras also stretch their necks out and put their ears forward when inquisitive. So this guy obviously wanted to greet me in a friendly way! So, a question for everyone reading this post. Are zebras white with black stripes or black with white stripes? This topic was discussed during a class on Zoo Veterinary Medicine years ago. The answer is at the end of this post. The owner of the quarry was on vacation, so it was just my striped friends and I enjoying the beautiful morning. Here is a photo of the site. My sledge had a good workout but unfortunately, little was exposed. This was all of my finds after 2 hours of collecting and most were already exposed. A suggestion given to me indicates this was the Ordovician, Bromide Formation. Since I do not know the formation for sure, identification has not been given to the fossils. #5 is very odd. I am not sure if it is a fossil or a mineral. Opinions welcomed! An opinion as to whether 6. is a bryozoan or a crinoid holdfast would be welcomed! 11. Initially, I assumed that this was a bryozoan or coral. But after cleaning it up and looking closer, I am wondering if this is a Floating Crinoid Bulb??? It was a specimen I hoped to find. The afternoon was to be spent exploring the Ordovician's Viola Formation. On the way, I photographed a typical scene of the area and of coarse, some more wildlife. The rains this past week with the resulting mud continued to make hunting difficult. But results from the Viola Formation pleased me. The brachiopods need a bit more prepping though. 1. Star shaped plates from the crinoid Colpodecrinus and a plate from a Rhombiferan cystoid 2. 3. 4. 5. This reminds me of Prasapora of the Decorah Shale but did not find Prasapora mentioned in the Viola Formation 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. Calyptaulax strasburgensis cephalon and Bumastoides billingsi pygidium. Hope everyone has enjoyed my trip reports. There may be one more after identifying my finds. a. So now to answer what color is a Zebra. Black! Black is color of a zebra. Beneath all that fur, zebras have black skin. Even under the white stripes!

After attending a conference in Norman, Oklahoma, I slipped down to the southern part of the state taking a few days to explore a bit of America I have never experienced before. This trip report focuses on the Devonian of the Arbuckle Hills, more specifically, the Haragan Formation. My research ahead of my trip provided me with a few marginal sites to play in. Little did I know, luck would be in my favor that day and provide me access to a couple great sites. I was collecting along a road, a site offered to me by a forum member, and not finding anything substantial. A truck came up over the knoll and stopped next to me. The occupant rolled his window down and asked "what are you doing" in a slightly unfriendly voice. An explanation of who I was and what I was doing appeased him. After a long and friendly conversation on many topics, he suddenly surprised me by asking would I like to fossil hunt on "his" property? He went on to tell me his parents, who really own the property, used to allow fossil hunters on the land for a fee. But due to their age and a few unscrupulous fossil hunters they ceased granting access. I asked him " is this the "White Mound" location and he verified that it was! What luck! He unlocked the first gate and the only thing he asked of me was to lock it as I left. He then said I would have to go through a second gate to get to the fossil site and explained I would likely be greeted by his goats at the gate. You can see he wasn't kidding. I was proud of myself for slipping my vehicle through the gate without a single goat escaping. As I arrived at the site, it became apparent, looking back down the path used to reach the site, that the goats were going to be my friends while I searched for fossils. Look at that train of goats as far as the eye can see. My guesstimate was about 300 head, all friendly. Fossils were weathered out, easy pickings! It was hard to keep track of what specimens I had found already so I didn't overharvest. Here are some of my finds: As mentioned already, a forum member referred me to this roadside collecting spot. It was explained to be by a gate with 2 eagle statues on it. This was Jimmy Houston's property. For avid fisherman on this forum, the name is famous as he is the star in the TV series Jimmy Houston Outdoors. For years, as I religiously watched him teach America how to fish, I took to the water applying his techniques to my fishing grounds, the Mississippi River. Maybe his educational techniques were too good, for the thrill of discovery diminished as I became a better fisherman. This caused me to loose some of my passion for the sport and looked elsewhere to satisfy my need of discovery. That's when I took to the sport of fossil collecting. Anyways, after gaining the knowledge that Jimmy lived there, I reached out to him and told my story. Then ended with an explanation that to find a fossil on his property would be as big a thrill to me as catching a 10 # bass. His response was quick and decisive. I was granted my wish. So after just an hour at White Mound, I had to leave my caprine friends behind and make a new friendship across the road. To reach Jimmy's house required going through 2 fancy gates (Oklahomans love their gates!!) and a herd of elk. Meeting Jimmy was wonderful. The better part of 4 hours was spent on his deck overlooking a lake frequently seen in his TV shows. Conversations had never related to fishing or fossils at all!! We just had a chance to get to know each other in a personal way. Eventually, he took me around his property on a 4 wheeler showing me where he felt there could be fossils. He tried hard to make my trip a success, but after hunting at White Mound, I was intrigued with a small dig site they use to get gravel for the road. It looked very similar and I soon had a few Houston fossils to take home! Here is a photo of the two of us. Currently, I am working on a shadowbox to include this picture and the fossils I found. In closing, PLEASE do me a big favor and correct any IDs or ad identification to fossils that lack it. Visiting new sites like this can be overwhelming when the identification process begins.

I recieved permission to fossil hunt the quarry in the western "suburb" of Bromide Oklahoma and am currently trying to finish identifying my fossil finds. One would think the Ordovician Bromide Formation would exist here but when looking at maps of Oklahoma geology, it lists the area as Middle Pennsylvanian. Can anyone clarify what rock I was looking at? Thanks!!! Mike

I was doing some landscape work today and found these hoof like impressions in a few pieces of flagstone. I believe it to be sandstone. And I know for sure it’s from Oklahoma, U.S.A. Any thoughts?

Can't remember if I have ever made a trip report before, but here goes... I have been conducting a lot of online research and found a new (to me at least) site that I wanted to explore. It appeared to be part of the Bois d'Arc formation in Pontotoc county, Oklahoma. I did the research, figured out the property owner, and got permission to access the site. I had to put off the trip multiple times due to the amount of rain we were getting. I figured the creek might be flooded. Finally almost a week went by without rain and I set a new date. Due to unforeseen circumstances, I got a much later start than I intended and so only had a couple hours to explore the site. On my way down to the creek site, I found a few miscellaneous fossils. Mostly crinoid debris, but also a few other odds and ends yet to be photographed and identified. The most interesting thing I discovered were three "concretions". I am calling them this for lack of a better term if not correct. They were immediately between two stratigraphical layers. I can tell there are crinoids stems going into the middle of them, but never seen anything like these before. Now I am trying to research how to clean/prep these so I can get a better view of the contents. I wasn't able to get pictures of them i situ because I misjudged the depth of the creek where I found them and was in "much" deeper water than I intended. Holy smokes was the water cold when it filled my boots! I already have permission to go back and explore again when we have had less precipitation and the creek is not so deep. Pictures below.

Having just returned from a trip to Oklahoma, I tried identifying my finds from the Lower Devonian's Haragan Formation. Success was had except these five fossils. Any help is graciously accepted! 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

I found this tooth in a creek bed a couple years ago, I didnt think it was anything special then but the more I look at it the more I question whether its just a really old tooth or a fossil. Any ideas?

Found this by ft. Gibson Lake in Wagoner, Oklahoma. Trying to figure out what it is exactly or an idea? Any help would be appreciated! Thanks!

Oldest Fossilized Skin Discovered, Clocks in at 300 Million Years Old Isaac Schultz, GIZMODO, January 11, 2024 The (open access ?) paper is: Paleozoic cave system preserves oldest-known evidence of amniote skin by Ethan D. Mooney, Tea Maho, R. Paul Philp, Joseph J. Bevitt, and Robert R. Reisz in Current Biology. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2023.12.008 Yours, Paul H.

Hello. I'm interested in a Permian Labidosaurus foot/leg. The fossil is advertised as being from Lawton, Oklahoma, Aroyo Formation. I am aware that this piece is a composite and that there has been some repaired bones. The size is not indicated. I'm wondering if these are genuine fossils. Any information is appreciated, thank you.

Good Afrernoon! Wondering if anyone knows if this is a fossil? I apologize if I am not posting in the correct area! First timer

Just wondered if anyone could tell me what they think of these pieces.

Not certain what this is. May be our vivid imagination, but to us this seems to look like a petrified lizard/croc head of some sort, with one eye intact. What interests me the most is the snake like skin. Feels like leather. The rock is very heavy.

I just got home from a fossil hunting trip to a site a few miles northwest of Durant, Oklahoma. Some friends own a small plot of land with a very shallow pond on it that just happens to be a good exposure of the underlying Caddo formation limestone and clay found all over the area. The limestone surface has been broken up a bit by natural erosion as well as by the initial excavation of the pond and construction of the dam, which is evident through a few scrape marks left by an excavator bucket. The site predominantly yields smallish (~2" in length) oyster fossils of varying quality but, there is also an occasional secondary species of small bivalve (Neithea?) and even less commonly, echinoids and turritella(?) casts, of which I only found a fragmented turritella cast today. Some of the oyster shells also have small holes through them, these might be due to worms, maybe? This is is the first fossil hunting trip that I've been on in quite a while and it's the first that I've documented for my Museum of the Cosmos project. I'll be 3D scanning the better fossils and hash plates I found today and uploading them to the Museum of the Cosmos Sketchfab account soon, along with a video on the YouTube channel and write up of the hunt on the main museum website. For now, I'm combing through literature to figure out exactly what species of Oysters these are (Gryphea, texigryphea...?), as well as the other bivalve (Neithea?).