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My latests hunts to my Permian sites have been slim. Still trying to narrow down the producing layer(s), but my test excavations have been dry so far. If you remember in my last thread, one of my spots was almost buried by overburden from a dozer work above. I had a strong hunch that there would be fossils in those debris pile and I just needed some rain to start washing it down. I was right! We have been getting quite a bit of rain lately and its helping uncover more. Last week I found a couple pieces of an Orthocanthus texensis (Permian age shark) head spine. I have found many pieces like this at this site, but these 2 parts went together making about a 3 inch long section. My biggest piece yet! Today, 2 more pieces were found. This section had lovely denticles! While cleaning and talking about them with my son, I got out the last section to explain the how the complete spine would look with the smooth lower, and barbed upper pieces.... AND THEY FIT TOGETHER! What made is more amazing was that the base section was found very high on the pile, and the barbed section was at the bottom. The break on the tip is recent, and I have hope I might still find the last 1.25 inches to make this 100% complete. I might just try digging and sifting for it. Its a narrow water-dug path these came from. The base section was wedged sideways up high, maybe the tip was flushed all the way down along with the most recent find.

Hi y'all, I was thinking again about some Permian reptile teeth, I've seen them referred to online as 'parareptile,' but would like collective and/or professional insight. They are pretty distinctive, with a smooth labial face, and a striated lingual face. These are all from Waurika, OK (Wellington fm, Lower Permian). I have several examples, but they're not much different from these two. @jdp @dinodigger 3.5 mm tall: 2 mm tall: They vaguely remind me of a Caseid tooth, which has the same character of the striations/no striations (or I at least think this one is Caseid...). ^ Reisz (2019)

Earlier this month I got the opportunity to return to one of my Permian fossil sites that I haven't visited since around April. The site is located in McClain County in central Oklahoma south of OKC. According to a geological map the majority of the area consists of the Wellington Formation, however the bottom of the exposed area is shown to be apart of the Stillwater Formation. According to scientific publications the only fossil producing layer is mentioned as belonging to the Wolfcamp (296.4 to 268 Ma) particularly the Gearyan strata. I've spent multiple trips earlier this year searching the layer mentioned as being the fossil producing layer but have only found plant impressions. Which I'll post some time in the future. Out of the entire outcrop though, I have only been able to find vertebrate remains in one particular spot. An area that appears to be below the known fossil producing layer. On this trip though, I only spent about 4 hours searching the site because I also had plans to visit family for dinner. Overall, I feel I had a pretty good half day trip. Below are some pictures of the vertebrate remains I surface collected on this trip. I must admit I haven't dedicated any real time to trying to identify the various species from the site yet and have only cleaned the material upon returning back home. But just looking through them while laying them out for pictures, there appears to be Eryops, Edaphosaurus, Diplocaulus, a small Captorhinid as well as an Xenacanthus shark. I've been collecting and cleaning the vertebrate remains from this particular site since March of this year but have focused the majority of my attention towards collecting, prepping and identifying fossils from a different site/formation here with in Oklahoma. All the following pictures are from my most recent fossil hunting trip. ⬆️ Overall view of the site. ⬆️ Quick separation of the bone fragments into various piles. ⬆️ Teeth, mostly Eryops megacephalus. ⬆️ Xenacanthus shark teeth. ⬆️ Jaw fragments, larger fragments appear to be Eryops megacephalus. ⬆️ Small jaw fragment with 2 or 3 teeth, possibly belonging to Diplocaulus. ⬆️ Large vertebrae fragments. ⬆️ Small sized vertebrae, the top row appear to be Diplocaulus. ⬆️ Edaphosaurus sail spine sections, a couple fragments might not be from an Edaphosaurus but were placed in the grouping during a quick sort of all the fragments. ⬆️ Various skull fragments, Eryops megacephalus, Diplocaulus and possibly Diadectes along the top row. Diadectes were one of the two species initially identified from the site along with a temnospondyl according to the research papers I read. I have had a difficult time finding clear close up images of the surface of a Diadectes skull. That is, at least from a legitimate scientifically described specimen that hasn't had the majority of the skull restored. ⬆️ These two pieces are the largest of the fragments that I suspect might belong to a Diadectes. ⬆️ Small limb bone fragments. ⬆️ Possible coprolites. ⬆️ Last but not least, concretions with bone fragments. At least one of the larger pieces has multiple vertebrae and portions of ribs. One small piece has what appears to be a section of jaw with 2 teeth still in place. One piece even has the exposed bases of a small Captorhinid jaw, showing atleast 3 rows of teeth. Interestingly, not all that far away in the next county over in Cleveland county near Norman there's a site that has produced the remains of Captorhinikos chozaensis and Captorhinikos parvus. Exactly what species this particular jaw fragment is from I have no idea. But I'm hoping when I do dedicate the time to identifying the species from this site, I will be able to find enough bone fragments from similar sized Captorhinid remains that I can get a general idea of what species inhabited the site. ⬇️ For these next pictures I used my loop and did the best I could at holding the specimen while also holding the loop still and then also holding my phone up to the loop and still managing to press the take a picture button on my phone. All while trying to hold still so the pictures did not come out blurry. The picture quality is poor but I hope in the future to invest in a digital microscope with a viewing screen. ⬆️ I suspect this might be the exterior of a jaw with two teeth still remaining in the jaw. The possible teeth are along the bottom of the fragmented red/white bone. ⬆️ Captorhinid fragment showing just the base of at least 3 rows of teeth. The broken teeth are the reddish and black donut shapes. ⬆️ This is the small concretion with the Captorhinid teeth. The teeth are located in the bottom goldish blurry blob. You can kinda make out one broken tooth in the top right corner of the goldish blur blob.

I’ve just recently sifted through some permian micro matrix from Oklahoma and I came across this and wasn’t sure if it was anything at all, it was very uniform and sleek so I didn’t immediately assume it was a pebble, it also had that strange split on one end. I’m not even sure if it’s a fossil.

I’ve just found this tooth in some Permian micro matrix from the Wellington formation, it is serrated and around a centimeter long. I’m thinking It’s dimetrodon or some sort of other basal synapsid

I’m sorting through some micro-matrix that is said to be from the “Ryan Formation” however I’m pretty sure that’s just the Wellington formation. I’m looking for some sort of ID on this, It’s about a half centimeter long. My apologies for the poor photo quality, It’s just so tiny and my equipment isn’t good enough

This little bone is around 2 cm long and I’d like to know if this specimen shows any indication towards a species. It was found in a set of micro matrix from the Wellington formation, Oklahoma

This claw was found in some micro-matrix I recently ordered, and I need help with a possible ID, I was thinking possibly Varanops or Edaphosaurus. It is advertised to be from the Ryan formation, now called the Wellington formation. The claw is just shy of one centimeter long

Hi all, I have been going through some of the coprolites in my collection in order to catalog them. I have two different specimens that have fish spine and scale inclusions. They are from Waurika, Oklahoma (Permian). 1. I want to verify that this is a fish spine. If so, could it be from a Xenacanthus?. Does anyone know if Xenacanthus had scales? The coprolite contains numerous scales. Of those that are visible, this is the best preserved. 2. This coprolite has a different type of fish spine. Any idea what type of fish it is from? That may be a tooth poking out above the spine. Based on the size of the coprolites, I'm assuming the coprolite producers were feeding on fry. As always, thanks for you help!

My friend from Florida is a major gourd collector and has items on display in several museums. He cannot resist anything gourd-related so he was compelled to buy this item with a label identifying it as a "petrified gourd" from Ponce City Oklahoma. I see where there are some Permian and Pennsylvanian formations near there so that would eliminate those areas if it were a gourd. I doubt we will be able to know whether it came from the Pleistocene terrace deposits to the east but gourd seems very unlikely anyway. This has a very distinctive look and the preservation seem fairly good so I thought someone might recognize it from the photos.

Had to work a few days in Oklahoma City this week and decided to make a detour on the way home and check out a site that has been mentioned here on the forum. The directions lead you down a dirt road just west of Waurika. It doesn't appear to be an overly visited site just judging by the amount of grass that has been trampled to get in. You could hardly make out the path in the grass. It was mentioned in previous posts that it is not believed to be private but judging that you have to go over an old barbed wire fence and under a new one, my guess is that it is probably private. Seeing no "posted" signs and hoping that Oklahoma law is like Texas and that if its not posted than the landowner has to ask you to leave, I did my best army crawl under the barbed wire and headed to what google maps was showing was the spot. I would be interested to know what caused the volcanic looking surface around the sight. It looks like places I have been in New Mexico and appears to be a very isolated area of the lava looking rock. My plan was not to stay long but to scope the area out for a half hour or so and take a bucket of matrix home to sort through later. Of course it was the first day that the Mercury hit the century mark and it may have just been the landscape but it truly felt like I was on the surface of a hot red planet. There are bone fragments and tooth fragments everywhere. I did not stop to pick up small peices since I knew my time was limited. My main objective was to get the matrix and get out without heat stroke. I found a couple of interesting surface finds. I found a small vert that maybe someone can help me identify as well as a couple of large teeth that I am guessing are from the amphibian archeria. I am glad that on the drive down I stopped at the local big box retailer and picked up a bucket. My usual MO is to use ziplock bags but that would have been tricky. My visions of nice loosely packed gravel filled with sharks teeth was quickly met with the reality of clay that is the equivalent of digging up pavement. I picked spots that had the most items present and could only get my shovel a couple of inches below the surface. I filled my 5 gallons and headed back to my car. The trek out was grueling in the heat and the terrain is extremely rocky. I have five gallons of clay in my garage I am hoping will hold some interesting finds but would also love some tips for breaking it down to reveal the good stuff. I have about a quart of matrix soaking in warm water right now. Any other tips would be appreciated. I will share more pictures as I find items. Below are a couple of my surface finds.

I got some Permian-age microfossil matrix a while ago, and I finished going through the larger stuff a couple days ago. I finally got some good pictures up, so here they are! These are from the Wellington Formation, Jackson County, Oklahoma. Most of the fossils I found were Orthocanthus, but I found a few that may be from amphibians or reptiles. Feel free to correct me in my identifications! I am often wrong, and I would like to be able to label these fossils with confidence and certainty. These, I believe, are Orthocanthus compressus: I think this is an Eryops sp. or similar amphibian tooth. I'm fairly certain it doesn't have any serrations, so I assume it is something other than a rootless shark tooth. I found lots of these bone chunks, with a very distinctive texture. I think they are Diplocaulus sp. skull fragments, but I'm not certain. This last object is interesting. At first I dismissed it as a worn old tooth, but then I noticed it has small holes near the base and the bottom has a texture similar to the texture I've seen in claws and foot bones. Is it an amphibian/reptile claw? More of these to come soon!