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Last week in a thread by @WyomingRocks! about Whiskey Bridge, a Middle Eocene Claiborne Group site in Texas, @historianmichael asked about ostracods from there. I said I would post some pictures, so here I go. I brought home a bunch of matrix from the site a couple years ago and have broken much of it down and pulled out the larger fossils, but I had not really gone through the micro stuff until recently. I sieved it through a series of screens and found the ostracods primarily on the 60 mesh screen. I have only gone through a tiny amount of it, but wanted to answer his question as I tend to wander off in all fossil directions and who knows when I'll get back to Eocene Ostracods - haha. I picked over two dozen specimens from several different species out of less than 1/2 TBSP of matrix. I wonder what all is in the quart bag of it that I have!! Artusy in his thesis (see below) recognized 46 species of ostracods, I have a long way to go. A few years ago @jkfoamposted an ostracod or two from this location in this thread: http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/11079-the-arthropod-that-cant-get-any-respect/page/2/ There may be other posts on the forum as well, but Eocene ostracod threads are not a huge topic! I am not an ostracod expert by any stretch, so others that are more knowledgeable (like @Acryzona) can feel free to correct or update any of my ID's. The literature that I found dealing with ostracods from this site is limited and somewhat old, but that is what I have. I'm sure there are more recent publications on portions of the fauna, but I have not tried to wade through that. I primarily used: The Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology Part Q (1961), a thesis by Raymond Artusy (1960) Ostracoda of the Stone City Beds at Stone City Bluff, Texas, Bulletin 114 of the Mississippi Geological Survey by William Moore (1970) The Jackson Eocene Ostracoda of Mississippi I know some of the pictures are not totally focused, but unfortunately at this magnification, there is a pretty limited depth range that is in focus until I learn how to do photo stacking. I hope you can get the idea of what they look like though, some of them are really intricate and wonderful looking. The last few pictures are really intricate specimens and I'm sure with some effort, I could get a more precise ID, but the differences are all in the details of the ornamentation and subtle shape differences and I haven't taken the time yet to master that. Enjoy!

I found a very odd fossil at whiskey bridge over the weekend and was wondering if anybody had any knowledge on what it could be, picture attached isn't the very best but I'm too afraid the remove it from the bag protecting it right now due to fragility, planning on properly preparing it once i get some paraloid in. BUT the fossil is about 4-5 inches long and 2-3 inches across, it is very fragile towards the end of it but the stem seems to be more sturdy. sorry again for poor picture and lack of scale, just don't want to risk further damage to the fossil yet. My only current guesses are a large piece of coral or some sort of vegetation. either way i know finds of this size aren't very common from whiskey bridge. thank you for any help with identifying.