Search the Community

This bone fragment is from the Late Cretaceous of the East Coast of the US. I am fairly certain it is from a turtle; however, I am not sure if it is a scute or perhaps part of the plastron. As you can see in the photos, it is fairly smooth and has a "airplane wing" shape to its cross section. It also has what I would call a "hole" on the side of the bone. What I am curious about, and perhaps someone with greater knowledge than me about sea turtle might know, is if the shape of the bone fragment and the "hole" are diagnostic enough to tell if this is a scute or part of the plastron, and if so, where it may have been located on the plastron. From my research, it seems like Osteopygis emarginatus is one of the more common turtles found in Late Cretaceous deposits of the Eastern US and is described with a fairly smooth scute with only shallow irregular divots displaying no particular patterns. Could this bone be from Osteopygis emarginatus? An alternative identification based on my research is Peritresius ornatus. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

Hi, I was hoping that you guys could confirm that this is a lepidotes dental plate (unfortunately minus the teeth). Found at Bouldnor on the Isle of Wight, UK. I’ve also added a photo of what I have hopefully correctly identified as a small piece of turtle shell. I didn’t find the shark teeth I was looking for, but these more than made up for it.

Hello, I'm looking to purchase some more specimens and was really curious about this one. It is supposedly placochelys from China and Triassic. The price just seems way too low for a specimen such as this. All help is appreciated.

These are fossils from the early Campanian of northwestern New Mexico, collected on BLM-managed land as part of the Menefee Expedition. The Menefee Expedition, which has run yearly since 2011, is a multi-institutional effort combining the talents of the Southwest Paleontological Society, Western Science Center, Zuni Dinosaur Institute for Geosciences, and formerly the University of Pennsylvania, permitted under the Bureau of Land Management in New Mexico. Fossils collected as part of the Menefee Expedition are prepared and stored at the Western Science Center in Hemet, California. If you'd like to watch the day-by-day of the expedition, be sure to check out the Expedition Video logs on YouTube! Baenid turtle shell- my find! Dinosaur limb end- my find! Large croc tooth, likely Deinosuchus- volunteer find! Leaf and stem- my find! Gar scale- my find! Dinosaur tibia- volunteer find! Brachychampsa tooth- my find! Bivalve, which I think is a unionid- my find! Crocodilian tooth in matrix- my find! Finally, a dinosaur toe bone- volunteer find!

It was really hot today, hunted in the rain, actually pretty nice. Kept the mosquitoes off of me.... Great opportunity to stand in water and looks for fossils....Lots of variation in the finds... I'll show_and_tell the more common finds and then ask for help on the last few... Turtle: Not many , but a few were pretty nice.. I have found lots of turtle . This one had odd fossilization.. A neural #2 .. @digit might confirm. A very nice Hemipristis, a Sawfish Vertebra and a rat jaw with canine.. A couple of bones. I think one is a radius. Any hints appreciated: These are sort of extra credit... 2nd bone, great shape ,, not a clue... In addition to the above , found a couple of hundred small colorful shark teeth... Now the ones to be identified wrong size for Horse, either Equus or Tridactyl. I have incisors for both and this just seems wrong.... I wondered about wild hogs or common pigs... so maybe this is a peccary incisors... I find little comfort in those guesses... and now this molar... Hard to get a good photo of it.... Chewing surface above... Enjoy.. All comments and suggestions appreciated.

We find lots of tiny fossils in this area and my son's were hoping for help identifying these treasures. Picture 2 & 3 are the same fossil just turned over. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hi guys, these days i was given this claw coming from kem kem as a birthday gift. This fossil was sold as a theropod claw, but it looks anything but to me. I assumed it could belong either to a sauropod cub or to a strange lizard not yet described. What do you think? THANKS XD

I found a concretion on one of our local beaches (New Zealand) with a bit of bone sticking out. The bone was different in texture from the cetacean material we usually find but I thought it was probably a large vertebra of some kind. Imagine my surprise when I started prepping it and the shape started looking more and more like a large turtle skull! It's about 17cm wide at the back so a chunky animal! I'm prepping it using a combination of air scribe (to get close to the bone) and vinegar (to remove the last 0.5mm of rock). The bone has an amazing texture, full of holes and suture lines. Very different to anything else I have ever found or prepped. Here is the video where I find it: https://youtu.be/VUvO5vKLIUg?t=149 I'll post again when it has been prepped but will be a few months If anyone has any papers on Miocene / Pliocene sea turtles, I'd love to know!

This fossil was found at Liaoning at the same formation as Psittachosaurus. Any idea what is that? A primitive turtle or a dorsoventrally compressed Psittachosaurus? The locals called it "turtle-back dragon" in Chinese.

Found this earlier today... was wanting to know if it's a turtle humerus? 4" in length. Found on a river gravel bank. Never really paid much attention to turtle pieces... now I see them everywhere.

I had went on a hike last year out in the badlands here in southwest Wyoming and stumbled across this turtle nestled up on a small peak. About a month ago, I took the same hike to retrieve what I had found ( horrible hike to pack a 50lb turtle on my back ha) and I was seeing if anybody might be able to tell me more about it by chance?

Hello! I have found these fragments on the beach over the years in North Carolina. I don't remember exactly which beach each one came from, possibly the Fort Macon area. I think they are all pieces of turtle or tortoise shells, but if anyone can help pinpoint these any further that would be cool! Thanks!

With my limited time in North Texas before my move south, I decided to revisit my favorite sites as opposed to scouting new ones. The NSR is a classic locality, but I had never actually gotten to check out the famed red zone for myself. Yesterday, I made the drive to the fossil park. I was supposed to hunt with a couple others, but it unexpectedly turned into a solo hunt. I won't complain though. The vast river emanates a magical aura that is uniquely felt when you're exploring on your own. The primary goal of the day was to snag a decent specimen of the red zone ammonite, Trachyscaphites spiniger! In an attempt to beat out the stiff hunting competition and high afternoon temps, I arrived to the site in the early hours around seven. Unsurprisingly, I was far from being the first car in the lot. As luck would have it though, none of the people there before me had their sights set on the distant red zone exposures. It's a long and taxing trip that only so many people (the crazy ones) are willing to undertake. After crossing under the 2990 bridge, I took in the view and tried to visualize where the destination might be. It was quite daunting, but the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Red Zone Road It was gonna take a lot of walking to reach the mouths of the red zone creeks, so I tried to keep the gravel hunting minimal along the way. Nevertheless, my eyes were still scanning the ground around me and the vigilance steadily began to pay off. After a few Enchodus fangs and a Carcharias holmdelensis tooth, I came across the first prize of the day. Cemented together in red zone matrix was a mass of turtle shell that I had never before seen a similar specimen of. It has some good weight to it and cool three dimensional character. I don't know enough to identify it to a genus assuming that's even possible. I believe Archelon and Ctenochelys are known from the NSR as well as other genera I'm sure. Articulated turtle shell fragments in red zone matrix Some time later, I came across an interesting bone fragment that I don't have much of a clue about. The texture seems like fish. It has pronounced ridges running longitudinally and a U-shaped spongy cross section. I held onto it in case it might be something cool. Mystery bone Here and there I came across various red zone ammonite chunks to whet my appetite. None of them were keepers in part because I had high hopes for what lay ahead. Maintaining my steady pace brought me to the mouth of the first creek I had circled. Yesterday's 25 foot rise was still draining and the sound of rushing water filled the air with occasional thuds from falling shales. In the high cliffs I could see a distinct red band of matrix slicing through the grey shales. Tracing it with my eyes, I followed the line upstream until it was within reach. It was absolutely filled with phosphate chunks and nacre-covered Baculites. After a short time, I locked onto a Trachyschaphites that was just poking out. Excitedly, I threw out my tools and began excavating. My enthusiasm was quickly washed away as I realized the chunk sticking out was just a chunk. This sequence of events repeated itself along the entirety of the creek and before I knew it, I was exiting with a bag of assorted Trachyscaphites pieces. The only interesting things to show were a beat up red zone mosasaur vert and some snails. Red zone mosasaur vert Gastropods from the red zone Now the temps had crossed into the 90s and beads of sweat were covering my face. Wanting to take a break from the red zone, I began a thorough search through the massive gravel bar outside the creek. It took awhile to warm up my hunting goggles, but eventually I spotted the first keeper of the bar: A big ole worn mosasaur tooth. Sadly, it was sliced in half and had chunks busted out of it. Not too long after, though, I got it a smaller, much more complete friend. Likely Tylosaurus proriger After these mosasaur teeth, I scored what I like to call a "pseudo-mosasaur" or its other name, Pachyrhizodus. It was pretty easy to spot the difference since a little bit of bone was attached beneath the crown. Still a cool little fish tooth. Pachyrhizodus I'm not very good at spotting artifacts despite having spent many hours in the creeks of Austin. Now and again though, I manage to blindly stumble my way into a killer point or two. Wedged into the sand beneath the receding waters, was the unmistakable base of a Gary. Haven't found one of these before, so I was pretty happy to add this NSR classic to my collection. Gary in situ Gary point The last and most interesting find of the bar was a huge chunk of Xiphactinus jaw! It seems to match up exactly with the very distal end of the lower jaw. Within two matrix-filled tooth sockets are a couple of emerging teeth. Distal end of a Xiphactinus lower jaw with a couple of teeth. Finally, it was time to set my sights on the creek across the river. To my knowledge it doesn't have a name as it is quite small. The disappointment of my previous red zone expedition set my hopes low. Although the tree cover was nice, with it came swarms of mosquitos and some sort of biting fly. I spent most of my walk through it flailing my arms trying not to become a walking buffet. The red zone was much better exposed and I quickly spotted a couple of Squalicorax that sadly weren't keepers. There were many Trachyscaphites fragments to waste my time, but at long last I ran into exactly what I was looking for! With careful swings, I worked the heteromorph out of the shale and quickly stored it safely in its own private Ziploc bag. With the primary objective met, it was time to quickly evacuate the mosquito hellhole and return to the safety of the sweltering sun. Trachyscaphites spiniger heteromorph (my favorite ammonite). There is a significant crack that hasn't completely split. Hopefully the b72 will hold. It was about 4 pm and I was close to my limit. There was another spot further ahead known for arrowheads that I wanted to see, but I was saving that for the people I was intending to meet (no cell service so I didn't know plans had changed). It became apparent no one was coming, so I gathered my bucket and pack for the long trek home. The adrenaline of fossil hunting had definitely carried me through the day. The river now seemed endless and every step of foot sucking mud taxed me more and more. After retracing my route at home, it seems I river walked at least 5 miles! As I crawled into my blistering hot car, I told myself one red zone hunt was enough for the rest of my life. But after a good night's rest and cataloguing my finds, I'm ready to go again . I guess we'll see how I feel next summer. Thanks for reading!

I found this today on a river gravel bank. This is the 1st of these for me. I figured it was turtle so I looked online and I think it's a (forgive me if I tangle it up) a Carapace bone (which is top of turtle shell) but also a Nuchal bone which would be the top front of the shell just above the neck? And it's made up of scutes? Can this shell pattern be pinned down to what type of turtle? It is solid. Size is 2.5 inches × 2.75 inches.

I'm trying to identify a couple fossils that were labled as turtle fossils. Does anyone know what they are?

Would love some background on this. I've seen Green River Formation fossils with big turtles before but never a tiny little fossil turtle. Unfortunately I don't know the provenance or the age. Any ID on this one? The scale in the background is centimeters. Thanks.

I apologize for the in hand photos, but I was getting the best lighting here and I believe if they are identifiable at all these photos will be okay. I found these all snorkeling in the Santa Fe river in north Florida the other day! My guesses are as follows: A - turtle? B - some type of ankle bone? C - mammal tooth D - really not sure but it looks like a socket from some large mammal maybe E - really not much to go off here for me personally, it was just such a large bone chunk that I had to take. Would be very interested if anyone has any guesses!

I can clearly see some sort of microfilaments inside but asides from that I'm stumped. Found North of edmonton eroding into the river. Any thoughts?

Hi, Am I correct that this toe bone from HCf "near Glendive" Montana is from a turtle? Thanks!!

I'm interested in a few of these turtle fossils supposedly found in the Neuse river in North Carolina. They are also labeled as Cretaceous. Do you think this is accurate or could they be from another age and or locality?

Four weird little pieces from Gainesville fossil hunting. Guess for 1 is maybe turtle? 2 is very dark and was hard to capture the detail on top even with a dslr and flash, maybe a fish part? The bottom two both appear to be some type of teeth to me, whether that’s crocodilians or cetacean I’m not sure. I’m not even certain they’re identifiable!

Hey everyone, new here, but hoping I’ve come to the right place! My family just got back from tooth hunting on shark tooth island and found these too and wondered how we could confirm what they are and if they’re just ordinary or could be extraordinary!

Link: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/netherlands-journal-of-geosciences/article/first-report-of-chelonioidea-cf-ctenochelys-from-the-late-cretaceous-of-the-maastrichtian-type-area/2F9C83B052182B5DB2AF792F2AC2F934

Hello, does anyone know some of the described soft shell turtles from the Lance Formation? Or a paper of some of the turtles. I am interested in a soft shell turtle from the Lance so any help is appreciated. Thanks.