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Yesterday (Saturday, Aug. 22nd), I went fossil hunting in Ellsworth County, Kansas again for elusive Dakota Sandstone leaves and unfortunately it's mostly a bust, just like the previous trip. Despite that, I enjoyed the scenery and found some odd rocks and few fossils from new sites. A new site produced a few small plates containing woody and plant material fragments. I decided not to keep them. Closer views... Remember that interesting sandstone from the previous trip? I regretted for not taking it home so I took another opportunity and revisited the old site to get that rock! The back of this rock is quite smooth and flat, I think it would be great to have it hang up on the wall, but I'm actually not sure how I will display it. Looking at it is like reading a 3D map! It's the only object I brought home from this trip. It's peaceful out there and the views of the Smoky Hills never gets old. ...continued on the next post.

Hey guys I’m new to the rock and fossil collecting! My name is Kristi, Michigan. I have a couple things I’m not sure what they are if anyone could help I would appreciate it!

Is there a scientific term for stones that are part meteorite and part earth rock.

Is this real or man made? Unsure what it is

Cleaning beach pebbles I was wondering if you have some household methods about cleaning pebbles that where found on the beach? For example I have some nice pieces of unakite but they are really pale, maybe because of the salt or algae and water alone doesn't seem to do the job. Thanks!

I have finally made the step to find my own fossil beds instead of relying on pay-to-dig type locations. My research has led me to a local formation which will be practically spilling out with permian specimens if I can find it. My problem is finding the very thin fossiliferous layer. I havent had a geology course since high school and I dont recall a whole lot of it. Frankly, I'm having trouble identifying rock types. siltstone, mudcrack, dolomitic mudstone, sandstone, paleosol, shales.... my head is spinning. I understand the grain size differences from sandstone to shale, but what I find in the field is confusing. I find the same appearing rocks with differing characteristics. In one location its a very hard sandstone with no apparent cleavage. In others its a wet, soft sandy-stone that will partially separate along planes. In another it cleave along clean planes but is extremely fragile and disintegrates into pebble size bits. None of these matches the fossil bed description except for the coloration. I understand these are likely different levels of the formation (and completely different "rocks"), but I cant really define what I'm holding. I havent found any fossils in any of the rocks I've search yet in road cuts. I have found some property locations with more possible exposures, I need to get permission to search them.

I appreciate this forum and it's contributors. I'm not an intentional fossil hunter but a passive rock collector seeking specimens for my gardens. I currently live in NE Kansas where Pennsylvania limestone is abundant. A recent acquisition piqued my curiosity and since discovering this forum realize I have a few past local and travel finds I would like to inquire about. What a fantastic and fascinating community this is !

Please help identify. I have a few ideas what I think they're. Thanks in advance

Hello! My name is Susan and I love to hunt for fossils and anything cool looking around our creek. I live in Indiana so there’s not much but I have found some neat items. The problem is getting the algae and brown over coating off of them to see what I really have. I would love to Identify them but I cannot do this with a book with beautiful pics cuz thats not what I find in the woods. Maybe you could help me but if not, it’s cool. I appreciate the help.

new to this. Can you please help identify these rocks we found at the beach in New England. Thank you.

Please help identify. Found at beach. There's a lot of it- its dense and non-magnetic .

Hi Everyone! I'm new here but was hoping for some help. My daughter and I were hunting for sea glass yesterday along the coastline in Jamestown, RI (there is a small, hidden location that has worn down glass, pottery, shells and stones) and I found a few treasures that look like they could be shark teeth but I'm not convinced. In your opinion are these worn down fossils or simply rocks that got my hopes up??? Any input would be greatly appreciated!

Hi everyone I am very new to the fossils world. I have always loved history and the idea of fossils, but until the quarentine of the world I hadn't really looked for some. My 2 yr old granddaughter loves to throw rocks into the creek while we were there I found a Braciopod fossil and since I have been down at the creek looking for other fossils.

Me and my fiance headed into Wauchula this afternoon to try to find some good gravel spots at the behest of @Shellseeker and his helpful advice given to me on my last post. I have been to the Peace a total of 4 times, all within the span of a month or two because these water conditions are just way too good to pass up. Every time I come back to the river I have a new game plan and every time I actually get TO the river the plan goes out the window. Today's adventure was no different. We pulled up to Wauchula Riverside Park (Crews Park?) and were pleasantly surprised with the condition of the park. I had read about some sketchy things happening in that area and while we were unloading our gear a police cruiser circled the lot twice, it made me feel safe about leaving my vehicle. The park seemed newly renovated so I was assuming these past cases of break ins and theft occurred before then. We walked over to the boat ramp and prepared to search for a gravel bed north of the park; that is until we came across a friendly kayaker and her son. She noted that down the river a little was an island that her fossil hunting friends liked to dig at but had to swim to get to it in higher water season since they didn't use kayaks. We were not prepared to swim but the thought of a glorious "fossil island" that my fiance can set her chair up on and watch me sift gravel for 8 hours was just too enticing and we abandoned our upriver plans and decided to head down towards the bends. We found a small sandy trail to take us as far as we could on dry land before we had to make any attempts into the river, there were many downed trees and root systems that would make walking the dry area pretty difficult. This trail lead us into some of the highest and thickest grass I have walked in. I felt like I was going to be attacked by a pokemon... or a snake... but we were lucky and did not have any issues. I think this is a trail in the Peace River Park. Anyhow, we found a nice spot to cross the deep part of the river and found ourselves on the opposite side of the bank, it only came up to our thighs but there was zero visibility in the water. Then suddenly, a dad and his kids make an appearance with their fishing poles... After a quick chat we learned he was heading to a similar spot around the bend to fish a hole... You should have seen the look my fiance gave me. How in the world would we be able to dig for fossils in the same area that this guy is fishing in deep holes?! WHERE IS FOSSIL ISLAND? My hopes were dashed, my fiance wanted to go back to gardner, and there was a huge downed tree in the middle of the river with no gravel in sight. TFF what would you have done?! I continued on. Luckily it paid off. We hopped up on the legal side of the bank and walked 20 feet further to the end of the first bend. It was there! Sticking out of the middle of the river like a huge zit ready to burst with meg teeth WE FOUND FOSSIL ISLAND! We hopped back into the river and crossed the deepest part to get to fossil island, it was about knee deep and the entire bottom sounded crunchy which my trusty fence post confirmed to be a pretty significant gravel layer. Fossil island was pocketed with holes from other diggers but I was more interested in the deepest part off the side of fossil island. I figured when the water level is up this deepest spot will get un-diggably high but since it is so low right now I can get 2 to 3 feet into the gravel before the water started getting too deep for my shovel. At this point the JoshRockz excavation project was in full swing. I was digging in this layer and in the first couple sifts we were already finding larger than our usual size teeth. We got about a foot down before my fiance decided to go surface collect and I was getting alot of clams in my shovel loads but not alot of teeth, I widened out my hole and noticed I was pulling out chunks of matrix as shown in IMG 6228. I will be displaying this piece, I have not encountered the hard rock matrix; I have only really encountered the thick clay in the deep areas of Gardner and I imagine this is how it weathers out of the walls of the peace. Around these pieces of matrix I started to pull up many megaladon frags and hemis along with smaller teeth of other variety and quality. These are the largest teeth we have found thus far and I am so happy with our first dig in this location! The only downside was that this area in general has alot of broken glass that fortunately did not harm me but definitely made me reconsider not wearing gloves in the river. I also pulled up about 15-20 iron nails that were at times in a pretty dangerous condition and large. Tetanus city. This was 2-3 feet down into the gravel I was pulling these nails out so I am a little intrigued as to where they came from. All in all I will be returning to Wauchula in the future and I cant thank Jack enough for his advice. Oh, Turns out the largest hemi (also) the largest intact tooth that we found (second left in 6226) was surface collected right on the top of fossil island by my fiance. Strange are the ways of the peace river... ps I am going to get a kayak because all of this could have been avoided and we could have been there in 5 minutes if we had one.

I collected some weird fossil rocks today from Lake Michigan in Wisconsin, what are they?

Feel free to post here all the extraordinary rock pictures you want to. Here those a friend sent me today : Stony tree, Bolivia Bardenas reales, Navarra, Spain Garden of gods, Colorado, USA South of New-Zealand Brimham, England Canyon Bryce, National park, Utah, USA Utah, USA National parc of Nambung, Australia The tower of the evil, Wyoming, USA Black rock geyser, Nevada, USA Fairy chimneys, Goreme valley, Turkey James Bond island, Thaïland Karlu karlu or marbles of the evil, North Australia Block of butter of Krishna, India Utah, USA Tenerife Cross of Malta, South Africa Montserrat, Catalonia, Spain Mushroom, Kansas, USA Nanya, Taïwan, China Palo Duro Canyon, Texas, USA Canada Tandil, Argentina Port Campbell, Australia Prekestolen, Norway Cheese slices, England (this one is dedicated to @Tidgy's Dad The rock of the spider, Chelly canyon, Arizona, USA Overruninning rock , Germany The pavement of the giants, North Ireland The wave, Arizona, USA The dovecote of Antequera, Andalusia, Spain Uluru, Ayers, Australia Wadi rum, Jordania West Australia

a small part of my collection. I am into rocks, fossils, shark teeth, shells and more! Love hunting for such!! Deb

washed up on Isle of Palms beach outside Charleston SC Upper left one has me dumbfounded. Would love to know if they are bones, what animal are they from

Greetings kind people, I'm so sorry if this is such a noob question. But I've searched and searched but I couldn't find answers to these on internet. (kindly correct me because I feel I maybe wrong): Smithsonian website said licking dinosaur fossil helps in identifying between a rock or a fossil... But isn't fossil a rock in itself? Fossils are made because minerals get replaced and it's not possible for bone to remain in its original state for millions of years. So, it's not the original material anymore.. so licking a fossil should equal to licking a rock? In that case, licking should not work?

Hello everyone, I am in desperate need of help with a huge debate I have been having with a friend over fossils preserved in ironstone concretions. From some of what I had read to some advice from other members I it possible to find vertebrate bone among shells and other mollusks preserved in an ironstone concretion. Whether it leaves a trace of the organism, morphs the organic material into the structure of the iron concretion through the decomposition with preserving, or whatever else it may be it seems to be possible. So recently I have hunted a place known to have recorded marine cretaceous shell and other mollusk found in ironstone concretion as well as cretaceous plants in shale, it seems like not to vast of enough study has been done there only from what I know, but since no vertebrate material had yet been discovered there though there can maybe be the possibility. I found these two particularly distinct pieces in iron concretions that exactly mimic the scute structure of soft shell turtle and croc in my opinion, I know how iron concretions are famous for leaving psuedofossils and such but these two pieces look way to exact and since its possible for shells and mollusks to preserve why not scutes? So I am here looking to end this debate, I'm looking for your opinion, can these be labeled as fossils, traces, etc? Or are these among some of the world's best iron concretions and nothing more. Your input especially if you are very experience in this subject would be tremendously appreciated.

These stones are related to that stone I posted as "Frankenstone". Most of the stone found in and around the area where that stone was found have a unusual amount of metal in them, most are magnetic and some appear to have been altered/modified. I just thought I'd post a few photos and maybe see what others think these stones might be about. Please bare with me, this will take more than one post to show enough for others to make a decision so I will show a bit more.

Hello fellow FF enthusiasts! So first of all, please bear with me, I basically just got into fossil hunting and my eye is not as keen yet, but I managed to have a nice hour / two outside and found a couple of different small finds, things buried deep within bigger sedimentary rocks, located just next to the river (some inside). I'm going to give some short info regarding where they were found and the geological age of the region I'm searching in. Location: River rocky beach (river Drava / Drave, southern EU). Geological era: Neogene / Neogene (-Quaternary) I will post some pictures, which are accompanied by a ruler in EU measurment (centimeters - cm). Like I said I'm no expert, but I will try to give some opinion on the pictures. If you are familiar with anything found here let me know, I'll be happy of just about any new knowledge and information that will be obtained Pic. #1: The way I see it, it looks like a 'Brachiopod' shell, but I'm not sure if it actually fits into the time zone. I would more likely say it is a 'Barnacle or a Theostraca' found in Pleistocene. Pic. #2: (three pictures of it total): I found this 'rock' already submerged in the water and by the looks of it it just might be a regular rock, but it's shape caught my attenion since it is very smooth underneath and seperated by, what it looks like, a channel of some sort? It's length is approximately 3 cm (1.1811 inch) long. Again, any info on this would be great! Pic. #3: No idea on this one. Maybe a part of a gastropod, like an inprint of the shell itself? Lenght 8mm (0.314961 inch). Pic. #4: Preety sure it is a gastropod of a sort, looks like the whole shell is solidly preserved. Underneath is also a small part, most likely a part of the upper and bigger shell. I would say it looks like a 'Neptunea contraria', but I can't say if it is actually from the Neogene period or something more recent? I would also like to ask for any tips how to remove it or at least not brake it when attempting to make the entire rock smaller. Also is it necessary to apply any substances to such things or will it survive like this, stored somwhere dry? That would be that. Like I said, it's not much but I was very happy to find anything at all. Thank you in advance for any answers and the time you will take to read the post!

I was hiking with the wife looking for an old abandoned Train tunnel built in 1899. [found it.] I saw some rocks that caught my eye and picked them up. One looks like Ar Quartz and one looks like it could be crinoid's but not sure. Any help appreciated.

Hello! Thanks for allowing me to join this forum. I am a rock enthusiast and being here in Pueblo, my husband and I come upon many rocks and things that we aren't able to identify. Any input is always appreciated as I share a couple of treasures we have. Thank you!