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I have recently added this piece to my collection. Was sold to me as a Sedimentary Stromatolite from Bolivia. No further info given. I have looked online and in my book and can't match it to anything. Is this a genuine Stromotolite? - it wasn't too expensive, and it's quite attractive either way. Photo of both sides. Roughly 11cm square

So I seem to have developed an interest in Stromatolites recently. Can someone suggest good / reliable books, websites or pdf papers where I can do further research Thanks

Hi from Greece found this few years ago. I was looking for plant fossils following some reports mentioning theese trees Pinus nigra, Buxus sempervirens, Fraxinus, Corylus,Pinus marritima, Quercus suber in petrified forms. Among findings was this is there any possibility to be some form of stromatolite ?

The fossil I am posting today does not contain calcium. I does contain agate and my question is could it be a fossil stromatoporoid or stromatolite or something else?

Hi Everyone, I've recently returned from a weekend trip to a fossil site in central Australia. The location contains siltstone laid from the ancient ocean once in the middle of Australia during the middle Cambrian. Both John R. Laurie and Dr P.D. Kruse have completed work on the site and have some publications accessible online. Along with a good collection of trilobites I came across a number of what I believe to be stromatolite fossils. The first image (1.1) was found on the way to the location about 150km before we reached it, the road cut through a much lighter shade of rock outcropping than we had previously seen. The formation appeared identical to the Arthur Creek formation, and judging from the geological surveys I have checked it should be part of the same formation. So keep in mind the first image is not from a known fossil bed, but is only from my best judgement part of the same formation. The remaining fossils in 1.2 are all from the known fossil bed, part of the Arthur Creek formation dating to the Templetonia (middle Cambrian). Top-left looks to me like a very typical stromatolite, similar to what is still seen today in Western Australia. The other fossils seem to me to be either the same stomatolite but seen at a different stage of weathering, or another type of stromatolite. I am interested to hear the opinions of those more knowledgeable! Thanks in advance. Trip Post: The fossil site is found in the location below https://www.google.com/maps/place/21%C2%B042'53.0%22S+135%C2%B039'38.9%22E/@-21.71473,135.66081,1873m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x0!8m2!3d-21.71473!4d135.66081 In the publication below, NTGS Elk 3 bore samples refer to the location visited. Stromatolite and bioturbated sea floor 1.1 Stromatolites 1.2

New member here. You all have been most helpful so far, thanks. These requested possible fossil ID were collected from a drained lake bottom in western Wisconsin (Vernon County). It is not soft like sandstone. There are two different items. The longer item (#1A-D)is shown on all four sides. The shorter item(2A&B) is shown just front and back.

I was given this Stromatolite as a gift from a family member who knows I have started to collect fossils. It came with no provenance and all the this person was told was that it is 3.5 billion years old. It looks genuine to me. Any comments? And any further info?

Is this a stromatolite? Or an indian tool?

I am not sure what it is. Maybe Stromatolite? Dense piece. The coloration looks like it with the red.

Here I have a sample of stromatolite which we get here in Czech republic. I am planning to go and try to find some myself but don't know much about them. Here I have a couple of probably silly questions. Are there different species? Are they always being cut? Is there any way to know if it's a good sample before it's cut? Ok, as you can see I really don't know anything about it so any info will be helpful. Sample on the photo is 14x11cm.

Is this stromatolite or a fossil?

Dear all, yesterday I went out for some hiking on Monte Faito (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Faito), a Mesozoic mountain near Sorrento/Pompeii/Napoli, in the south of Italy. This 1400m mountain is mostly made of dolostone (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolostone) and limestone - like Dolomites in the north of Italy. In this photo you can appreciate the rock layers of this beautiful mountain viewing the Gulf of Naples. On the path of my excursion, I found (free on the ground) and picked a brown piece of rock that caught my eye because it was different (but not the only one) from all other light gray rocks. Here you can see some photos that show the strange radial texture that cover the top side of the specimen, but also the layered side that is also very interesting and may help identifying it. First of all, is it a fossil or a mineral formation? If it is a fossil, what kind of marine fossil? While writing this topic, I found this map - http://www.isprambiente.gov.it/Media/carg/466_485_SORRENTO_TERMINI/Foglio.html - that shows all the different formations of the mountain. I collected the specimen maybe in CLU or CRQ formation. The map includes the name of all the fossils that can be found in every formation (CLU and CRQ formation's fossils are listed in the first column on the right side), I serched on Google the name of every fossil written in the map, but none of them seems to correspond to my specimen. Please, help me giving a name to this specimen Thank you!

I purchased this piece last year from a miner that found this near the surface in Missouri. It's quartz on lace agate on stromatolite fossil. There is a little chalcedony in there two after examining it. I am just learning about fossils and searched this forum for stromatolites and nothing came up (that I could find) so wanted to share this with all of you. I took some photos with a macro lens of the crystals, agate and the stromatolite. I really love examining everything with a macro lens

Hi, Here is the photos of a "Stromatolite Fossil from Morocco" that I just going to get from a seller, but after I read a post from another member, I am confused. A member named Ebo mentioned that this is not a real Stromatolite. How is the real Stromatolite Fossil looks like? I googled "Stromatolite Fossil from Morocco" and most of the photos looks similar to my photos.

Found this in Western South Dakota, someone suggested it might be Stromatolites? Anyone know? Thanks!

Side view of stromatolite piece (~10") and view of partial encrustation for ID please. Thanks, Gordon

Tammy and I left South Florida yesterday and arrived in Spokane, WA after a short stopover in Las Vegas. Didn't win any money in any of the hundreds of slot machines in the Las Vegas airport but then it is significantly more difficult to win when you don't sit down and pour your hard earned money into the gaping maws of these one armed bandits. We drove from Spokane up to an area in the northern panhandle of Idaho near Lake Pend Oreille to a small town (population 530) called Clark Fork. We settled into the Clark Fork Lodge and had a surprisingly fancy meal at a quirky little place called the Squeeze Inn. I had not suspected I could get a really tasty IPA and a dish of gnocci gorgonzola in such a small rural setting but it was a truly welcome surprise after a long day of traveling. This morning we headed a few minutes out of town to a locality I found in my Rockhounding Idaho book. Someone took the time to transcribe all of the 99 sites listed there and make a Google Maps map out of it which can be found here: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1yS2FsEzCIFPU2_G1Pr5SH3oN9DY&ll=45.56234707000023%2C-114.16501500000004&z=6 We were at site 8A (48.15076, -116.15902) in this book which listed fossil stromatolites in a roadcut just out of town. With the help of Tammy's iPad we easily navigated to this site and spotted the roadcut and got out to have a look. There was lots of rusty brownish rocks on the talus slope of this cut as described in the book's description of the site. We could easily see the outcrop at the top of the hill from which these broken chunks of rock were sliding down to the road level. We scanned the rocks for the distinctive rusty squiggly pattern described in the book (which said these were quite common here). Try as we may we could not find anything matching the stromatolite description in the text. We did see evidence of extremely ancient shorelines with rippled and cracked muddy sediments frozen into place hundreds of millions of years ago. I tried to load one nice looking piece into the back of our JEEP but, given the current laws of physics, I did not succeed. I tried several times to work my way up the talus slope but the rocks were just too loose to gain much of a foothold and get very far up-slope. Any attempts to climb up resulted in sliding back down on a carpet of rocks that dropped away just as quickly as I stepped upward doing a pretty good mimicry of the stairmaster endless escalator exercise machine at my gym. As I couldn't see any definite stromatolite pieces down lower in the piles I suspected I'd not find anything different higher up and didn't feel like a major injury on the first day of a 10-day trip (for once, common sense got the better of me). I did find a smaller piece of ripply shoreline that I considered lugging back in my suitcase and an interesting layered piece that was quite different from most of the other rocks but I was there for (what was supposed to be an easily obtained) sample or two of fossil stromatolite and, striking out on this locality, gave up with only photos to remember this fun but fruitless hunt.

Hello forum members Do different stromatolites have classifications/individual Latin names? I can't seem to find much on the web. I've been given these stromatolites which came from Morocco and I'd like to label them. Thanks John

These finds are from South Texas in Eagle Pass. The surrounding material is soft shale(?) and sandstone(?). I think these are corals and stromatolites, maybe from the cretaceous period. I'd appreciate confirmation. I included a wide shot with my hammer for scale indicating where the "coral" was found. If I can date that location, I might be able to at least estimate dates for layers above and below. This will help me know what kinds of specimens to look for. I'd love to find *anything* with a backbone for a change. You know, so my wife will stop making fun of me. :-) Edit: After some research I am starting to think the cylindrical fossils are sponges. The egg-shaped fossils might be iron concretions, and the one that looks like a pot might be a mineral concretion. I found an online photo that looks almost exactly like my find: http://www.thefossilforum.com/uploads/monthly_04_2013/post-6208-0-44995700-1365008261.jpg Wide shot Possible corals (edit: or sponges) Possible stromatolite. This is interesting. Almost perfectly round "patty" about 3 or 4 cm thick. Slight depression (0.5 cm to 1.0cm) on one side. (edit: maybe a sponge or echinoderm) Possible stromatolite. Looks like a pot! (edit: or a mineral concretion like http://www.thefossilforum.com/uploads/monthly_04_2013/post-6208-0-44995700-1365008261.jpg ) Possible stromatolites. Look like dark brown eggs. One of them shown is unbroken. (edit: or iron concretions)

Hello guys. I'm very new in fossil collection. Not so long ago I purchased a box with stones, meteorites and fossils at garage sale. Now I'm trying my best to ID what is what. Can you please help me to identify those cross section slabs I posted on photos. Size of bigger slab is 82mm (3.2inch), thickness is 6.6mm (0.26inch). It has distinctive pattern of spiral "oncolite stromatolite dots". All sort of suggestions will be very helpful. Unfortunately no information was left by previous owner of that box. Cheers

I bought this recently in Agadir for only $25 so I'm happy whatever it is. It is said to be a stromatolite, though it may be just a desert rose of some type, though it's very hard and heavy, definitely not gypsum or barite. Some sites on the net suggest precambrian, ranging from 2.6 down to .6 billion years old, depending where you look. Some say Cambrian, some Ordovician and others Devonian or Cretaceous. Any ideas anyone?

Since the weather was warm today we did a day trip from Springdale, Arkansas to a stromatolite reef north of us near the Missouri border. The temperature reached 60 but there was still some snow and ice. Since Billie and I are lapidary enthusiast, I cut a few pieces we found. The striated patterns are beautiful and since the masses are preserved in silica (chert) they will take a high polish. We found some nice specimens also. Stromatolites are laminated structures built by blue green algae also called cyanobacteria, one of the simplest and earliest known life forms. Basically, each layer of algae contains sticky cells that trap sediment when it is washed over algae’s surface. As sediment accumulates, the algal layer grows through and over the sediment to the top to trap more sediment. Since blue-green algae needs sunlight for photosynthesis, stromatolites are restricted to shallow water within the photic zone. Fossil stromatolites are preserved in the Ordovician age Cotter Formation .

Hi guys, When I look online, I see mostly photos of fossil with solid cross sections, with all of the banding, or else the living stromatolite examples in Australia. However there was one publication through the University of Wisconsin extension by Neme and Bemis (2002) that has a rendering of a stromatolite that looks similar to this one which I found at Mazon in the South Unit: Do you think this is one? Next, I found these two specimen in the same gully on Easter Day, in Richland County, Wisconsin. There is a similar fossil in the member collections... http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/gallery/image/8447-cryptozoon-rosmontensis/ Right next to that, I found this large laminated-looking, hollow rock thing. Is it possible that this is a stromatolite that has not been recrystalized? Can stromatolites be hollow? Thanks very much for looking, Jann

Hello,TFF! Another undetermined(I think fossil) is what I want to post here.I dont know nothing about it,just that it was found by me in a river,in Romania.I think is a Stromatolite algae colony. Can you please help me identify? Thank you. Dimensions of specimen: aprox.55x45x30mm