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Hi everyone! Last week we went on a weekend trip with our fossil club the BVP to go on a fossil hunt to the jurassic clay cliffs "Falaises de Vaches Noires" between Houlgate & Villers-Sur-Mer in Normandy, France. https://www.paleontica.org/locations/fossil/68 The famous cliffs of Vaches Noires date back to the Jurassic period, and span both the Callovian & Oxfordian stages (166 - 157 mya) and the Cretaceous period spanning the Cenomanian (100 - 94 mya). Back in the jurassic this area was a rich marine environment and fossils that can be found here are many species of bivalves (like Gryphaea, Lopha & Myophorella), ammonites, gastropods, belemnites, brachiopods, crinoïds, sponges and other invertebrates. The cliffs are also known for marine reptile material and even dinosaur material, though these finds are rather rare but you'll see some nice pieces in the museum pics later. We arrived Thursday afternoon (november 3th) and stayed to Sunday (november 6th). We were very happy to join this trip organized by our club since it is probably the last year that fossil searching is allowed in this amazing location. We were with around 27 people I believe and met each morning at the entrance of the beach at Houlgate. We searched the cliffs for 2 days and went to the local museum "paleospace" on sunday. The weather was amazing for the 2 days of searching, it was even sunny the first day! The first few hours we mainly searched among the rocks on the beach which were littered with large Gryphaea fossils and other bivalves like Lopha gregarea. After our lunch break we moved on to search more near the clay to find smaller fossils. On our second day we again searched the clay, went through some interesting places in the sand which were littered with oysters, gastropods and had some ammonite and crinoïd fossils and we ended the day at the cenomanian rocks in search for some fossil urchins. The Cenomanian rocks on the beach A piece a chalcedony A partial ammonite Me very happy with my first complete ammonite, which I found next to me while having lunch One of the mystery fossils which nobody could really determine (we brought it home along another we found) The tubes seem to be pyritised. I believe it to be some kind of Echinoderm and someone suggested it might be a Crinoïd with a parasite on it. But eventually our top finding (and the best of the entire trip) was spotted by my girlfriend Elise and is this gorgeous fish (probably Lepidotes sp.)

G'day everyone, maybe someone can help me with the identification of a fossil. Recently I was on vacation in France and had the opportunity to visit the famous Falaises des Vaches Noires at Villers-sur-Mer (Calvados, Normandy). While searching the beach at low tide I found many fossils of invertebrates, but at the end of it a loose bone, too, on the foreshore. So it is most likely from the Marnes de Dives formation (Callovian), but I cannot say for sure, of course (the Marnes de Villers is overlying). As far as I know vertebrate fossils from there are represented by marine reptiles and dinosaurs (rare). My first thought was dinosaur, so I contacted Troodon. He does not think it is dinosaurian and recommended to post my find here. My second thought was paddle bone from a marine reptile and from what I have seen it appears to be a possibility, but I am actually a dino tooth collector and would like to rely on opinions of people who are more familiar with bones than I am, especially with bones from marine reptiles. Here it is (third picture: measured in centimeters): Does anyone have an idea?

Hello, i have this little piece of fossil (2-3 cm) that i have no idea what it can be. Its from falaises des vaches noires in France which is Cretaceous/Jurassic area. There are mostly marine fossiles here. I was thinking fishbone fragment or plant? If anyone could help me i would really appreciate it.

Though I've found plenty of info to help me identify what I collected at Vaches Noires I haven't sat down to get it all straightened out, and I thought I 'd post these images of a few items found during 2-3 hours walking on the beach from Houlgate to Villers-sur-Mer. I'll see if I can't give it a go during the holidays and add a few tags, but I thank any of your suggestions :-). Of these #17 is not a fossil and include it as a comparison to #14-16 which are equally sized but much thiner and blue/black in colour. Also not sure whether #8 and #27 are fossils. Just at the beginning of the cliffs there are large numbers of rusty fragments among the large limestones and I am not sure to what extent these are remnants from shells of the military type or from boats or other harbour equipment (not that there is much of a harbour to speak of) or metal refuse. I didn't get a chance to inform myself during my short stay about this and haven't found hints online, but the Germans put a battery on top of the hill by Houlgate which was heavily shelled. The info regarding the geology of the site was swipped from the French and is only an indication of the geology of the beach where one is allowed to pick fossils, not the cliffs themselves which release fossils as they are eroded. I don't include any Griphaea dilatata which have a truly impressive heft. I wouldn't be surprised if these were used as hoes or tools and weapons back in the stone age. Cheers

Hello everyone, I had the fortune to stumble across this forum as well as fosiel.net/paleontica, and am thankful for the plentiful information. I am a near absolute beginner as regards identification/nomenclature of fossils, geologic strata, etc, but am slowly making my way when time allows. I currently live just south of Paris and am interested in exploring the region. I travel also occassionally through Sweden, Denmark and Germany and am on the lookout for possible spots to stop and have a look around. I had my first expedition in France at Les falaises des vaches noires, one of the best spots imaginable for an introduction to fossil hunting. It did not disappoint. I have at least one more trip planned, this time to the cretaceous region east of here, and may of course imbibe some of the local quaff along the way, in particular at the caves of Legrande-Latour. Any pointers and questions welcome.