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As I went through the rocks I had collected in October from the Ordovician's Galena, likely Stewartville Formation, a SMALL gastropod popped out of a piece of matrix that was split open. After looking thorough my references, I could not place this fossil. Hence the need of your help.

I have found a few of these mis identified fossils from the Galena/ Ordovician. A request for identification was made awhile back and I labeled them Asgadaspira evolvens based on a response given to me. Having just exposed another one, I searched for it on line and nothing came up. Did I misspell it or am I just out in left field? By the way the first one measures 8cm by 5cm.

Found what I think looks like a trilobite cephalon in a creekbed, but I'm not certain. It was fragmented, and the shell looks to be eroded away. This creek had a slurry of Mississippian aged Burlington Formation and assumed Ordovician aged Trenton Limestone mixed throughout. I found Mississippian crinoids and Ordovician cephalopods at this location. It looks like it resembles Illaenus taurus, or some other member of the Illaenidae. Any opinions?

Greetings from Oberwil, Switzerland. I'm a new member on thefossilforum.com, but I've been collecting fossils from roadside stops and occasional dedicated outings for nearly 30 years. I'm a chemist by training - I fell in love with making new medicines, and have stuck with it. I find it mind-boggling to relate to the age of the fossils I'm holding...life is far more ancient, far more mysterious, far more marvellous than our imagination can comprehend. I've learned to respect life deeply...this planet is the only one where we know it exists, and has existed, for unimaginably long time. I'm in awe. I'll share some pictures from my collection in the coming days, in hopes of finding out more about where they fit into the grand scheme of life. My favorite fossils are Ordovician (Paleozoic), but I've come across some real stumpers from my trip to Madagascar a few years back; those fossils are almost certainly from the late Mesozoic. I'll be asking for advice on them soon. Ah...I'm now a Swiss citizen, but I was born to German (Swabian) parents who had emigrated to southeastern Tennessee in the early 1960's. Switzerland is home to me now. Best regards Mike

On a trip to southern Indiana yesterday I met a member of the fourm, Newbie_1971, and he helped me find my first trilobite! I found several well preserved gastropods as well as some pieces of isotelus trilobites.

Hi everyone! I was in SE Minnesota recently, looking through limestone outcrops where I have found cephalopods on a previous trip to Mystery Caves, MN. While looking for more cephalopods during my most recent trip to Fillmore County (and finding a few) I found this piece shown below. The fossil is likely Ordovician aged, as is common in SE Minnesota. The formation I am less sure about, but if I had to make a good scientific guess, it is the Galena formation. My question is if this is a cephalopod fossil that is just heavily eroded, of is this just a cool rock? I decided to also flip the fossil with my hand to better see the ends. Thanks for the help everyone.

In my Secret Santa gift last Christmas from @connorp I received (among other nice items) a very nice little hash plate from the Mifflin Member of the Platteville Formation (U/M Ordovician, Blackriverian, ~453 MY) from SW Wisconsin. The picture below is the plate as it was received and in my 12/20/22 post about getting it I said: “A great hash plate. I already see two or maybe three different trilobite types with a couple of them tantalizingly partially buried and an interesting gastropod that I am not familiar with. I think a little prep work will make this even more spectacular. As an added plus, it represents my first fossils from the state of Wisconsin.” I finally got around to doing the prep I talked about and spent a little time exposing some of the more prominent fossils and giving it a gentle going over with air abrasion to bring out some of the features. I think it looks even better than it already did and I was even more impressed with the wide variety of fossils on the small section of rock. Below is the cleaned up plate: Here is a collage of the plate just turned at different angles to the sunlight in case it helps to bring out any features: There are hundreds of fossil fragments on this one small piece of rock, but I want to highlight the top couple dozen specimens. With the help of some TFF members via previous posts and replies in a couple of ID threads I put out (thanks @Tidgy's Dad, @connorp, @piranha, @minnbuckeye and others), I have identified several trilobites, brachiopods, gastropods, ostracods, bryozoans, and a crinoid and want to show you this wonderful diversity in such a small space. If anyone sees changes to my ID's please feel free to chime in. Some will be very specific ID's and some will be a bit more general. The picture below is the key to where each of the numbered specimens is on the slab (see number in upper left of each specific picture). We will start with the trilobites. Although each is only a partial, there is enough present to get a pretty specific ID on most of them. All are new genera or species in my collection. Here are the brachiopods: Here are a couple of specimens of a really neat gastropod which was new to me. So often it seems Paleozoic gastropods are just internal molds or rather plain forms, but this first one is very nice. Here are a few bryozoans and one very small horn coral. There were several of these small corals, I'm not really sure of the ID, I didn't research them much yet. Just a couple of small crinoid columnals were found. And last but not least are the ostracods. I am used to small ostracods (which some of these are) but there is also this one form that is huge (by ostracod standards) coming in at about a centimeter long. At first I thought they were brachiopod fragments until I looked at them closer. These things are the size of a kidney bean! Note the scale difference between the Eoleperditia and all the others. Most of my ID's are questionable as I was using a reference that is for the immediately overlying Decorah Formation until I can find a listing for the Mifflin Member. OK that is everything for now. I hope you have enjoyed the wonderful diversity of this small slice in time. With a little more investigation, I may yet tease out a few more specimens worthy of an ID. Thanks for looking. Mike

My annual excursion to visit my family which migrated to Kentucky years ago took place at the end of October into November, lasting two weeks. Of course, the planned trip took me in the vicinity of some excellent fossil bearing sediments and though quality time with family was the primary purpose, I did hope to add to my collection. All of the spots I visited were ones I've been to before; however, the first stop was a new one for me- Paulding, well known and documented on the Forum for its Middle Devonian marine fauna. I drove from the suburbs of New York City for almost eleven hours, raining most of the way, arriving at and spending the night at a hotel in Defiance, Ohio. Paulding was about fifteen minutes away. Drove there the following morning, It was a brisk forty degrees, mostly cloudy, but sunny at times. A TFF member I was supposed to hook up with there unfortunately had to bail last minute. A nearby quarry which exposes the famed Devonian Silica Shale had, years ago, stopped allowing collectors to hunt there. There was a big outcry and the quarry set up a fossil park dumping fossiliferous rock onto a property they owned which the public were free to collect from. Much of it is now overgrown and much of the rock has been reduced to gravel. However, there are still many fossiliferous chunks out there if one is willing to look.

Hi everyone! Longtime human recently turned into amateur fossil hunter. I currently am in the Twin Cities in Minnesota, and have been for the past 5 years. I've been enjoying lots of the beautiful nature the state has had to offer in my downtime, even during the winters which are not as bad anymore. I will say that I have always loved paleontology! That, marine biology and astronomy are what propelled my love for science, and what have pushed me to pursue a PhD in Chemistry. I never knew fossil hunting was an activity anyone can do, or even possible to do, until earlier this past summer. I had an awesome trip to the beach with family, and while everyone swam, I would walk the shoreline for hours looking for shells of different sizes, colors and species for almost a whole week. Toward the end of my trip, I went to a marine biology museum and talked to some of the curators and learned that fossil shark teeth are a usual find by beachcombers, but usually you had to have an idea of the shape or accidentally bump into it. I was so thrilled to learn that was possible, so I made it my objective to at least find one tooth by the end of the trip! And I am glad to say that I found quite a few in a couple of hours of trying! I even found a few other fossils (a small piece of soft shell turtle carapace, a crab claw, not shown) Since then, I've been trying to do some research when I can (again, graduate student so I have other research duties!) and try to explore the natural history of Minnesota. I've found the broken up pieces of braciopods shells everywhere on the Platteville limestone on the Mississippi River, as well as bryozoans, a few gastropods and cephalopods, and, as my username implies, a whole slew of crinoid segment and columnals! Crinoids just speak to me, and I find those circular wonders everywhere! Most recently, I recently went to a trip to SE Minnesota and met up with a well known Forum member and went hunting for giant gastropods. It was a super success! Even if there was certain fossils we couldn't remove. That's a little about me, and I'm looking forward to learning more from everyone around here! I'm hoping to get help with FossilID for some things that I have found, and maybe connecting with others that know the area or neighboring states like Iowa! I would love to get a general idea of where to hunt, and go on more adventures and make some friends! If you'd like to see some of my finds, I'm more than happy to post some of those here as well

I have a nice little slab of Platteville Formation (Mifflin Member) from the Ordovician of SW Wisconsin that I received from @connorp late last year. I am working on a post that describes all of the great things in it, but want to get a couple of ID's cleared up so I can be more concise in that post. Here are three trilobite pieces found on the slab that I have taken a stab at an ID, but would love confirmation/correction. Hopefully there is enough there for some of our trilobite experts such as @piranha , @Kane or any others to offer some advice. Thanks for any insights anyone can offer. Each picture is numbered in the upper left. Mike Here is a picture of the small slab with the location of the trilobites in question numbered. The sharp eyed will see another trilobite cephalon in the lower portion of the slab. I am fairly certain that one is Gabriceraurus mifflinensis. Here is the first question. This looks like the best match I can find for species listed from that formation, but I'm not certain. I wish I could get this one a bit cleaner, but the matrix left is pretty hard and stuck to the pygidium. This one may be a stretch as there is not much there, but maybe enough to be recognizable (or maybe not). Thanks for any help.

Over a week ago I took advantage of our university's Reading Week break to hop a train east to do some late season digging. Apart from a few surprise finds, it did not quite live up to my expectations. I had to hastily organize it as I had got the dates wrong, assuming Reading Week was the following week (one of my students corrected me). It meant getting the trains and motel all lined up with barely a day to spare. Upon my arrival in Toronto for a layover, someone not all together upstairs thought it would be a wise idea to pick a fight with me. I defused the situation, but it certainly help set the tone for this week-long adventure. On the first day of the dig, I ended up walking about 25km for nothing. On the next day I went back to the spot that had been so productive weeks before, but this time it turned out to be the opposite with two exceptions. Unlike last time when cheirurids were popping out like they were going out of style, not even more than a pygidial spine of one this time. Instead, a pair of crappy Flexis:

I was storing more of my collection away the other day, when I saw the eye of my Colpocoryphe specimen. Eye lenses! My other specimen has them too, but the eyes are a bit crushed. I thought it would be nice to share. I never saw these, and the second one was the first ever trilobite I got. I can’t believe I never noticed them.

Each square is one centimeter. What is this mould of? Thank you!

Hi all! I am back again (this time in Montréal and found a peculiar looking fossil. It is very circular, almost has a subtle stippling on the top surface (which leads to think maybe a sort of precursor coral/bryozoan). It popped out very cleanly from the rocks we were excavating. The other fossil for ID is the brachiopod in the 4th and 5th pictures: Topside Underside Side Profile (its rather thin, but thickest in the middle - somewhat dish-like) Measurements Brachiopod for ID Thanks in advance! -Em

Found in a creek in Alton by the Piasa Cave. Looks like the exoskeleton of some arthropod. Any idea on what it is exactly?

Howdy all, Found these in my usual spot in the Drakes formation. The first two look like some sort of bivalve, not a brachiopod. The second looks like some sort of coral.

Howdy all, This is something I've wondered for a while. What is the relationship between the Drakes and Kope formation and what are the differences?