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Found at the famous Caesar Creek spillway, which exposes the Liberty and Whitewater formations. Thinking Grewingkia canadensis for the horn coral. The brachiopod is not a spiriferid, and is too round for Vinlandostrophia. Four ridges (pictured) suggest Lepidocyclus perlamellosa/Hiscobeccus capax for the calcified brachiopod. And ideas what the circled encrusting bryozoan may be (circled red)? It is not patterned like Escharopora falsiformis--the zooids cells have no pattern, more like Aspidopora sp. Feel free to contest my identification; I am always looking to improve. What are your thoughts?

Hello all, it’s been a long time. I started getting back into fossil hunting now that I’ve gotten older. I had the chance to go out fossil hunting last month with my fossil club and a few friends. I’ll post the pictures over time of my finds. We went out to southern Ohio and southeastern Indiana. We stopped first at Caesar’s Creek. I had never been to any of these sites so it was very exciting. Everything at Caesar’s Creek is tiny, and you aren’t allowed to take anything larger than your palm/hand home with you. The most common find were absolutely tiny brachiopods which literally litter the spillway floor. If you want to find anything, you’ll have to get on your hands and knees. I managed to find plenty of brachiopods and a few bryozoans. But the best finds were 6 of the smallest whole trilobites I’ve ever seen or found. All of them smaller than my pinkie nail. Followed by some nice gastropods, a few pieces of horn coral, and a section of a cephalopod shell with its inner chambers partially intact. I was bummed that I didn’t find an isotelus roller but there’s always next time. If anyone could help with ID on these that would be greatly appreciated. More to come in other posts in this thread. Sorry for the poor photography, all I have is my phone camera.

Hello dear members, in this post I'll show you the fossil bonanza of Caesar Creek State Park, near Waynesville, Ohio. This summer I spent a day collecting fossils in Ohio and I visited three sites: Trammell (I talk about it here http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/98830-trammel-fossil-park-ohio/), Oakes Quarry and Caesar Creek State Parks. The latter was the best, both for finds and general experience. It is in fact regarded as the most accessible fossil hunting locality on Ohio: over 150 m (500 ft) of fossiliferous rocks are exposed, due to the works for the constuction of an emergency spillway back in 1978. Since then it has attracted the attention of paleontologist and amateurs. In order to collect, you have to sign an authorization at the nearby Visitor Center and you cannot use tools or collect specimens that are larger than the palm of your hand. Nevertheless, you'll find and be able to keep some exceptional material and I consider my experience as the best ever in a fossiliferous locality! Three formations crop out: Waynesville, Liberty and Whitewater formations. They date to the Upper Ordovician, a period when Ohio was covered by a shallow inland sea and was characterized by a tropical to subtropical climate. Beds of limestones and mudstones formed as the result of storm waves and currents; in a few cases the effects of super-hurricanes and tsunamis can be recorded. the fossil assemblage is dominated by clusters of brachiopods, bryozoans and horn corals. aragonitic fossils, such as bivalves, gastropods and nautiloids are preserved as internal molds. articulated and frequently enrolled trilobites can be found, as well as fragments of Isotelus, a very large trilobte and State Fossil of Ohio. In the Visitor Center a small diomara shows the Caesar Creek biota as it apparead in the Ordovician, alongside some fossils, including a perfectly-preserved Isotelus specimen. In the field, I collected fossils only from the ground, not on the walls (where you can only take pictures). i found a lot of isolated specimens, here I show the larger and more impressive clusters. Let's start with a picture of a section of the exposure And now the fossils! In the clusters, many kinds of fossils are preserved, in particular brachiopods and bryozoans, of which many species can be found. Horn corals are easily distinguishable: In this case, I think the cephalon of a trilobite can be seen: This was a huge Bryozoan cluster! And now, my favourite specimen, the genal spine of an Isotelus trilobite! Finally, a picture of me holding a rock densely-packed with bryozoans and brachiopods. all right, that's all! I hope you liked my post. I really loved the experience at Caesar Creek: everywhere you looked you could see museum-quality specimens. I spent only a couple hours at the site, but I have never seen so many fossils in a single place! I higly suggest anyone to pay visit, you wont't be disappointed. Thank you, Fabio

Hey all! I'm new to the forums and this is my first post so I figured I'd show off my recent finds. I'm just an 18 year old from Michigan and this was my very first time fossil hunting. Seeing as how there isn't good fossil sites in Michigan, the next best place to look would be Ohio, and luckily I live near the border. I had read different opinions of Caesar Creek and was skeptical of whether or not I would find some good fossils out there, but I decided to go since I had to start somewhere. My family of 5 went down there for the weekend and went to the spillway on Friday. Luckily, the freeze-thaw cycle had just ended and it rained over night. We figured this would be the best chance of the year to find some good fossils. We were the only people there all day and hunted for about 4 hours. With 5 people hunting we were able to find a good amount of fossils. We found a lot of brachiopods and bryozoans of course, and then towards the end we started finding more gastropods and horn corals. We were bummed that we hadn't found any trilobites all day when we finally found the sweet spot. About 10 different pieces of Flexicalymene and 3 of those being whole and enrolled. We were pretty stoked to be able to find those and some of them looked really nice. I realize they're just some basic Ordovician marine fossils but everyone has got to start somewhere and I'm happy with the collection I was able to start. Already planning a trip to Fossil Park in Sylvania for early May since it's just an hour from my house. And then looking to possibly go to Calvert Cliffs/Brownies Beach in Maryland during the summer to look for Miocene shark teeth and others in the Chesapeake. Let me know if you see anything wrong with any ID's, that'd be great but other than that enjoy these mediocre pictures I took.