Search the Community

I need help identifying this Bone I found after a storm at OBX. The sandal in the picture is a mans size 10.

I have recently found dugong, whale, and dolphin ribs. Hunting friend gave me a tiny rib that we both thought might be dolphin. He is NOT a bone collector. I found a small dolphin tooth. It is 13mm. How small do these get? and then a predator tooth. I will just leave the photos, and request comments and identifications.

Hi all - I did not have time in January when I normally write these up, but thanks to Covid quarantine I managed to get some time last month and write up a comprehensive review on my blog of every single 2019 paper in marine mammal paleontology. Enjoy! https://coastalpaleo.blogspot.com/2020/05/2019-in-review-advances-in-marine.html

We are on vacation at Atlantic beach NC. My wife and l went shell collecting and I just happened to find these. I recognize the ray mouth plate but I'm drawing a blank on the other, dolphin or fish?

Is this bone from a porpoise or dolphin? it came from Palo’s verdes California and was found on the beach there. If so any idea on the age?

Found this tooth the other day at a miocene exposure along the Potomac River in Virginia (Westmoreland State Park). Hoping someone can help me identify Thanks in advance - Mitch

Hi all, I had a fairly productive first outing to Westmoreland State Park but I have no idea what any of the fossils I found are. I am happy to provide close-ups of any of the individual fossils, and in addition to the photos here, I posted some to imgur to get around the size restriction here. https://imgur.com/gallery/2uIedQS Thanks for your help!

Good day out on the bay, I kayaked down the cliffs in the morning and pulled in to do some surface collecting. I wasn’t finding many large shark teeth but I found my most amount of dolphin teeth in a day!

Great hunt today, left with a hand full of nice teeth, the best being my Chub and my dolphin teeth

This one is a first for me. Online sources indicate perhaps dolphin/porpoise/whale? Can anyone narrow it down? Myrtle beach find. Thank you! - Paula

A couple hours of sifting and surface collecting, found a nice Mako, a couple Snaggeltooth and a handful of small teeth. Also came away with a small porpoise tooth and porpoise rib, vertebrae, and Epiphysis disk fragments.

Friends of ours had their daughter come to visit for the holidays. She likes to rockhound and collect crystals and pan for gold back in the Seattle area where she lives and was eager to try the experience of fossil hunting in the Peace River. The weather (and river level) was looking good till a few days back when that huge mass of unstable air over the southeastern US unleashed torrents of rain. In fact, we were kidding Kelly that it was her presence here that brought the Seattle weather. She had a red-eye flight into Fort Lauderdale airport a few days back and on the morning of her arrival, the FLL airport received 4.5 inches of rain in an hour--shutting down the airport due to runways that were under water! Her flight was diverted to Miami but the airline she was on does not normally fly to MIA and there were no gates nor attendants to great the flight. They sat on the tarmac for 3.5 hours till they could find someone to unload the plane. Of course, they couldn't manage to unload the luggage at Miami and so the plane flew up to Fort Lauderdale later in the day so that the passengers could finally be reunited with their luggage. Hope there were no cruise passengers on that flight or their holiday vacation was well ruined. The bulk of the rain went north and south of the Peace River drainage basin but it did catch enough to push the river level into movement in the wrong direction. Canoe Outpost (where we rented our canoes) has been measuring the river level in Arcadia by calling the "normal" river level the point at which their floating dock is level with the bottom stair of their fixed dock. They declare fossil hunting season "open" when the level is 12" BELOW this "normal" level. The rain had pushed the level to around 9" ABOVE normal or just under 2 feet higher than I'd have liked it to be. We only had Saturday available as a date to try this and so we did. At worst we figured we'd have a relaxing trip down the river by canoe--in the rain! (Did I forget to mention the weather forecast was for warm temps, near 83F, but with an 80% chance of rain?) We chose a 10:00 a.m. departure over my normal choice of 8:00 a.m. which maximizes the workable time on the river with the canoes due back in before 5:00 p.m. This let us sleep in just a few hours more with a departure of 6:00 a.m. instead of 4:00 a.m. We loaded ourselves and the fossil hunting gear, snacks, and change of clothes into our friend's minivan and were off very nearly on schedule. It was an overcast (but dry) trip across state to Arcadia where we arrived in good time to sign in and catch our bus to the put in. We were pleasantly surprised to find Canoe Outpost to be celebrating their 50th year in operation (and Becky, the owner, there for 35 of those years). The peace sign in much of their signs is both a reference to the Peace River and the summer of love that was 1969. To celebrate, the canoe rentals were half-price and our two canoes for the day came for the price of one. I was quite happy to find that, though the levels were higher than I'd hoped for, the large well known gravel bed just downstream from the put-in at Brownville Park was not too deep to work. The current toward the center of the river was ripping and made it tricky to stand up and keep sand/gravel on your shovel as you raised it from the bottom to the sifter. One side of the river was protected somewhat by some trees in the water just upstream and was easily workable. The waist-deep water was comfortably cool (78F) and high enough not to have to bend over much but not too high to work effectively. There were a few other canoes launched with our group but they rolled past us when we stopped to start fossil hunting. We spotted a few additional canoes pass us from the 11:00 a.m. put-in but otherwise (mostly) had the river to ourselves. A large group (tour?) of 9 jet skis came flying up the river while we were taking a lunch break. They slowed just a bit but the wakes definitely caused a stir as the combined waves smacked our canoes pulled up along shore. We were to encounter them again on their return trip downstream a few hours later. This time we were paddling and had to move to the side of the river and point the bow of the canoes into the huge waves to keep from capsizing. Jet skis and canoes simply do not mix well. At least nobody flipped over. It remained a cloudy day with the sun only making a few brief appearances to cast some color on our sifting screens filled with black gravel. We got sprinkled and full-on poured upon several times throughout the day but Tammy even remarked that the warm air temps and a windbreaker jacket actually made the rainy canoe paddling rather pleasant. The warm temps had a number of gators (big and small) out trying to sun themselves on the banks. In total we spotted an even dozen of them in the first half of the trip back to Arcadia. There are fewer good haul-up spots and the fading light toward late afternoon usually means we see few if any gators on the last half of the paddle back downstream. It was interesting seeing the new tree falls along the banks and the other changes to the topography of the river after the summer's floods. It appears that someone's boat had come loose and found itself in a rather non-seaworthy state among the willow trees along one bank. A good example of the power of the river in flood stage! We tried to get into a deeper spot on the river that for some unknown reason is chocked full of dugong rib bones. It has larger chunky gravel and so I like to look there for the promise of larger fossils (like meg teeth). I like to take newbies to the river to this site as they can then collect multiple "paleo paperweights" as I call them and maybe come away with a meg tooth (or at least a decent fragment). We pulled to canoes to the bank at this spot and I got out to check it for depth. The bottom usually slopes down from a sticky/slipper/stinky muddy bank into a deeper channel a few meters from shore before becoming more shallow rising up onto a bit of a sand bank. I walked (slid) out into deeper water and got to neck level without it ever getting shallower and so (as I feared) this site was simply impossible at this river level. We paddled on to a final spot I like to stop at which has only fine pea gravel but often provides a copious number of smaller dime size shark teeth. I enjoy taking groups with kids there as we have a competition to see how many shark teeth per screen we can find. I believe the record still stands at 26. This site is also quite shallow (even dry sand bars when the river is good and low) and so I knew we'd have no problems there--it was my ace in the hole in case the other locations were all not accessible. In addition to many nice tiny teeth it also delivered some surprises.

I recently found a distressed canine in the Peace River. When possible I really want to identify all such fossil canines. The length is 1 and 1/8 inch. At the river I seemed to see (photo #1 & #2) "latitudinal banding" which means marine mammal. At home, I note that the root end turns to the side of the canine (photos #3 & #4), a characteristic that I mostly associate with porpoise. So , what is my question: Do all Dolphin/Porpoise teeth have such banding? The only reason I do not detect it on 95% of my Florida Dolphin/Porposie fossil teeth is that the banding is covered by cementum. I appreciate all responses, Jack Here is a picture of Whale tooth composition. These are Peace River or Bone Valley Whale Teeth:

Hi,would anybody recognise this please, i assume its a tooth of some kind, its from an elderly ladies collection, 3cm long.many thanks

Some good friends offered to take me hunting for a couple of hours today.. thank the Lord for good friends. It was only 2 hours but I found some unusual items... including a number of high quality dolphin small verts. Then this one showed up... unusual, meaning I have never seen one like it previously. It's a vertebrae and I thought this would be trivial-- just search the net for "fossil dolphin Axis Atlas vertebrae". No luck... So what is it ? Tail vert.? what?

Picked up on beach along with numerous whale verts and bones. Very dense & heavy, with defined (yet worn) ends. Closest match I could find is a dolphin humerus... Any ideas are welcome.

Hi everyone! I recently acquired some dolphin & shark teeth, but they weren't ID'd so I was wondering if some of you might be able to help me out if possible. The first are a set of small dolphin teeth found in Hoevenen, Antwerp in Belgium (Miocene, 15 - 10 mya) And I was wondering if they could be ID'd to down to genus? I've read Eurhinodelphis is a common find and that there are quite a few more named and unnamed species to be found there. The other fossils that I hoped to be ID'd are 5 tiny shark teeth from Oosterzele (Lede formation), Belgium (Eocenen, Lutetian, approx. 44 million years old) I've searched this website as they has a database with I believe all the species found there, but I am not confident and skilled enough to ID them properly. http://users.skynet.be/belgiansharkteeth/Lede formation/Oosterzele set.html My best guesses are that the first 3 teeth belong to the same species and the most common at Oosterzele, which are worn down Otodus auriculatus teeth. As for the other teeth I don't really know, so I really would appreciate some help and input. Thanks in advance!

As many know, I have hunted the Peace River Florida for over a decade. I love finding whale teeth and have been fortunate in finding them. I also like dolphin teeth, but the ones I find range from tiny (half inch) to small (1.25 inch). Today I found my largest dolphin tooth at 1.6 inches. It is broken but I really like it. Interestingly , it is hollow from the break to the root. So, what do we know or can surmise about the dolphin that had this tooth? Kentriodontid ? For me, this tooth at this size is really rare in the Peace River.

Hi all I purchased this cetacean skull fragment from a person who collected it in South Carolina many, many years ago. She said that she found it specifically in the ACE basin (Ashepoo, Combahee, Edisto Basin) while diving. I want to see if anyone can help me identify the species. I figure it's a cetacean skull, likely from an odontocete (?sperm whale or relative), and possibly consists of the premaxillary bones (with the large fossa for the melon) and others. I've included a number of photos. It measures 16 in long, 8 in wide, and 7 in tall and weighs over 13 lbs. Any information would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

1. Hemipristis serra: One of my first teeth of the day, found in the water. Small, but nice colors and perfect serrations. 2. Carcharias cuspidata: Flawless sand tiger. Symmetrical and super sharp, with both double cusplets intact. 3. Galeocerdo aduncus: Gorgeous tiger, almost looks like a G. cuvier because of size. Very nice root to crown contrast. 4. Odontocete tooth: Little porpoise/dolphin tooth with a long, thick root. In very good condition. 5. Ecphora sp.: A very nice small Ecphora, nearly complete, just missing the white part at the top. Rare to find more than a fragment of these at Brownies. Cast your votes! The poll will end in three days, on April 4th at 3:00 p. m. EST. Hoppe hunting!

Last week I was on holiday in the Netherlands/Belgium for a short time and I had the chance to visit the area of Antwerp to find some shark teeth. Too bad the weather wasnt good (I think it rained the entire day). Nevertheless I found some teeth and I have to say that I am kinda satisfed with the result! I almost sieved the whole day so my body still hurts a bit The material I searched in comes from the Miocene, Pliocene and was washed up from the extension of Churchill dock in Antwerp. Here are two "in-situ" pictures: A nice tooth on the sifter: Pictures of the nicest teeth: A nice dolphin tooth with enamel (4 cm long): A dolphin ear bone: (a little bit more than 2 cm long) An Isurus retroflexus tooth (3 cm long): And an 4.2 cm long Cosmopolitodus hastalis: (I am not sure if I determined this one right ...) I think I will post some more detailed pictures of other teeth in the next days! Thanks for watching

I found this a few days ago along the Virginia side of the Potomac River along a miocene cliff. It's mostly if not all Choptank formation. Any ideas about a genus? Grid is in inches. Looks like maybe mature dolphin tailbone, but it's so small???

After tallying all the votes on the Hop 5 of my trip report, the "Hoppe Tripmaker" for Bayfront Park 01/04/19 is.......... #3 Odontocete Tooth Odontocetes are toothed whales, including dolphins and porpoises. Fossilized teeth from these creatures can be found in Miocene sediments such as the Calvert Cliffs, where this particular specimen was discovered. They seem to be relatively uncommon, especially when compared with abundant fossils like shark teeth or shells. My collection only contains about 15 of these teeth in total, and this one is perhaps the prettiest and most well preserved of them all. It's a gorgeous tooth, most likely from a small dolphin, and certainly deserving of the title of Tripmaker. The best find of each trip is not always the biggest! This little tooth beat a large Mako and complete cookie (which tied for second place, by the way). Below is a picture of the Tripmaker under my brand new magnifying glass. I hope you all enjoy the new Hop 5 voting concept. Thank you to all who participated!