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The other day I went on a annual trip to a quarry in Iowa. Givetian age rocks. Finds were few this time around, for me at least. This was my best find, although not perfect or complete, still a nice example. It was tricky to prep as I didn't want to destroy the reddish- mauve brachiopod contrasting nicely with the caramel colored E. noorwoodensis. Thanks for looking!

Hi, I have three bones today that need your help to ID. They were found on Iowa River's alluvial deposits. Thank you!

Fossil Plants From Cave Deposits, Near Pella, Marion County, Iowa lepidostrobus Sp. Brongniart- arborescent, 310 Mya old, Club Moss locality, Pella, Iowa Formation, Pella Beds Age Pennsylvanian The Lepidostrobus is the generic name for the cones of arboresent lycopsid. It corresponds closely in structure with the fertile spike of the living Selaginella. The spore-bearing leaves are attached to a central axis in a crowded spiral arrangement, and their outer ends curve over so as to form an imbricated, diagonally arranged pattern, resembling that of the stem itself. The Lepidostrobus cones produced spores and megaspores.

Omphalophloios Sp. Lesquereux Pennsylvanian Arborescent, 310 Mya old, Pella Beds, Pella, Iowa Omphalophloios is a genus of fossil lycopsid trees in the Carboniferous system.

Planning a serious Iowa excursion for my Uni before winter hits. Was curious if any of you have done any rockhounding around the Le Grand area. Apparently is a site for exquisite crinoid plates. Just curious before I start calling the stone company and procure access/permits/etc. https://www.legrand.lib.ia.us/Library-information/fossils/crinoidfossils was sent a link to this by a contact at UNL...hence my sudden interest https://www.iihr.uiowa.edu/igs/publications/uploads/Em-04.pdf

I read a lot of fossil hunting reports on here, but I don’t post many. I think it’s primarily because it is usually many, many months after I have gone when I finally get everything cleaned up, ID’d and take photos, etc. It just seems too after the fact to me at that point, haha. But this time, due to a wonderful “tour guide” we had, I wanted to get something posted in a relatively timely fashion. Because of that, I haven’t had time to do a lot of research I need to do on specific ID’s but luckily I’m somewhat familiar with most of what we found to make at least an educated guess. I have seen numerous folks on here show some of their finds from the Ordovician and Devonian of Iowa and nearby states and it always looked intriguing to me as I have collected the Ordovician in the (relatively) nearby Cincinnati area and the Devonian in the Great Lakes area and Oklahoma. I wanted to see how the Iowa stuff compares. So my wife and I opted to take the long way home from Indiana to Texas and swing through Iowa (and on to South Dakota, but that was more for sight-seeing). I had done some research on sites to check out and contacted Mike @minnbuckeye to see if he could help me high grade my list. Being the absolute gentleman that he is, he did one better and offered to act as our tour guide for a day of collecting through the Ordovician! What a guy!! I can’t thank him enough for taking the time to do this. We had a great day and hit a bunch of nice spots, most of which I had not found on my own and certainly didn’t know some of the very important details of the sites. Many folks have said it in other trip reports and I can only add to the chorus of how valuable it is to go with someone that knows the area and how nice it is of TFF members such as @minnbuckeye to offer their time and energy to do it. Based on Mike’s recommendation, we spent our first day doing some collecting in the Devonian rocks of the Coralville, Iowa area. The first spot we could not access due to some current road construction but we made our way to the next one and spent several hours along the Iowa River/Coralville Lake collecting from the Coralville Formation of the Cedar Valley Group. You quickly learn how Coralville got its name as the rocks are a coral/bryozoan limestone. There are brachiopods and other fauna, but corals make up the bulk of the fossils at this site. And there were some very nice ones as you can see in the pictures below. Beautiful Hexagonaria, huge horn corals and others. We also went to the Devonian Fossil Gorge and a nearby state park, both of which have nice exposures of Devonian rocks with fossils, but no collecting. Here is a shot of the area, fossils litter the ground. This represents our total haul from this site The horn coral in here were abundant and quite large. Corals What I believe are Hexagoanaria corals. I think with a little cleaning, these will look really nice and I like the juxtaposition with the horn coral. Brachiopods and bryozoans A nice piece that was a little too big to take.

These two finds are stumping me a bit. Both are from the Maquoketa Fm (Upper Ordovician) of Iowa. The first one initially struck me as a 3D graptolite, but it could be a crinoid stem. I couldn't get a good photo of the cross section, but it is rectangular.

This is a tusk I recovered from a river sand bar in Iowa 24 hours ago. The tusk was in somewhat damp sand. It started to degrade right away once it was unearthed. I wrapped the tusk in a towel but it did dry out a bit. I got it home about 5 hours later and re-wrapped it in damp towels. I am writing this post to spell out my plan based only on reading some other posts but not based on any experience. I would appreciate any advise. What am I missing or doing wrong? -Add many zip ties to hold tusk together. Leave crusted-on sand for now. -Wrap with damp towels and wrap that with plastic trash bags, NOT completely airtight. -Store in dry basement for several months to gradually dry out. -After drying period, carefully clean and "baste" with paraloid b-72 50:1 -Use more concentrated paraloid b-72 to glue loose parts. Lots of small crumbled pieces to deal with somehow. -Cure for several days and then fill voids with PaleoSculp (or equal) a little bit at a time. -Sand and buff -Make a stand and show off! Thank you for looking!

I found this today in the yard while doing some light soil work. No idea where it may have come from. Thinking it might have come up from the frost over the years. Look like sinew or even fat tissue when I saw it buried. After bringing it up and cleaning it up thought it looked like a giant arrow head. Then it even appeared to look as though in the pointed portion on the item it had what looked almost like growth plate lines like we have in our bones. The stub end looks a lot like a joint or knuckle of some point. We are located near the Iowa and English river basin's In Iowa. Any help would be great in identification of this item. And maybe it's just a black rock. I have other photos but it won't let me upload them. It is about 12" long and about 9"'s wide and about 3" 's tall.

I am undecided if this is fossil or dendritic deposits on a rock. It is from Keokuk limestone, Mississippian.

Another post regarding a specimen I found posted on a Facebook fossil ID page - which no one in the group can ID. This was found in a river in Iowa. Most of what is found in the area is Pleistocene to modern. My first though was part of a turtle shell attachment point? But I am stuck.

This was found on a rock bar on the Des Moines River near Boone, Iowa, USA. The piece is approximately 4.2x6x4

This piece was found while surface hunting in a field near Boone, Iowa, USA, It measures approx. 6x3x2 cm

This was found on a rock bar on the Des Moines River near Boone, Iowa, USA. Since you can't see the ruler very well in most of these pictures the piece is approximately 6x5x2.5 cm

Hi, I found this in Pensylvannian glacial till around a reservoir. It’s about 12” long by 5” in diameter. There are coal seams nearby. I think it’s a lycopod part of some kind but it doesn’t match most of the pics I’ve seen. Can anyone tell me more? I’m curious about the layered appearance. I don’t think it was in its original location as it was stacked on a big rock with other specimens. I left it in place due to regulations. Would have liked to keep it! Thanks!

Any clues to the genus of these crinoids? From Augusta, Iowa.

I recently bought this jaw and was wondering if someone can shed some light on it. Seller gave some info on it, but when I received it it’s a little different than expected. Seller states it was found in Iowa. It also seems very light if it’s fossilized, I have no experience with fossil bone so I’m not sure what to expect. Any help is appreciated. Thanks

I know these are mammal teeth. I'm pretty convinced that at least the one on the left is a bison but would like to confirm. Would also like a rough estimate of age of possible.

I found this fossil in Devonian rock in Johnson County, Iowa. I think it is a fossil of a placoderm fish, and I think it has a "fin" next to the quarter in the photo. The fin would be coming out of the placoderm plate at a perpendicular angle, which would make sense, but I have never found a fin before. I will attach a close-up photo of the "fin" below. Am I on the right track or is this something else? Thank you! Ben

A few weeks ago, just when we were inundated with the spring muddy season, I stopped at a site that features Decorah Shale with a little Platteville mixed in. If you haven't collected in the Decorah Shale, let me say it stays MUDDY even in a drought!! The site had been worked over for a finish grade. This means the site will soon be lost to vegetative overgrowth. So I proceeded to collect a 5 gallon bucket of mucky matrix to clean and examine at home, in case the weeds invade quickly. Here are some select finds from that bucket.

I discovered these two rollers in Fayette County , Iowa in the lower Maquoketa, Ordovician. This location is well known for Anatophrus borreaus trilobites. Though the next lower formation changes abruptly to almost 100% Isotelus. Did I find one of each? Rollers make IDs tough on me. Then as long as you "trilo" experts are looking, can you ID the trilo-bits 1,2 and 3 in the next picture? Thanks for helping!!

Due to an upcoming order from our Governor to stay at home, I took the opportunity to fossil hunt last Sunday afternoon before it begins. The ground was white with an unexpected snowfall overnight when I left the house but soon melted. My goal was to look at road cuts for rock slides from the winter's freeze thaw cycle. Digging and splitting would be tough with frost still in the ground. The first spots searched were Ordovician, Galena. Here are a few representative fossils from the Galena of SE Minnesota: From there, I slipped over the border into Iowa to look at Ordovician, Maquoketa. A sluffed hillside provided me with some rock that I wasn't that familiar with. Here are some finds: The first picture is almost clay like, different than the normal Maquoketa that I am used to.

My wife found this jaw bone on a river sand bar in central Iowa last fall. I think it is a sloth jaw but not certain. The smallish size is what gives me a little bit of doubt. I have not found anything else other than a sloth that fits. Am I missing something? Thank you!

Collected in northeast Iowa which is part of the Driftless, very rugged with lots of streams and flooding that cut away the earth. Most fossils here are Ordovician. Most are limestone of the Galena Formation. HOWEVER, this area is a hotbed for mammoth and mastodon teeth and bone finds that the locals call "dinosaur bones". That said, there is an area recently rumored to have a lot of "dinosaur bones" just 30 miles southeast east of Spring Valley, MN on the edge of Iowa. No one wants to talk about it for fear the government is going to come and confiscate their finds. Posting for a friend, so not my find. This is truly an intriguing rock. Spherical, I want to say "cherty" like a possible internal mold, the straight line and the way it is cracking almost like shell on the outside is also interesting. This could just be a very cool rock or...??? He sent me pictures and I am posting it in hopes that someone has seen something like this before. Since I am not very familiar with fossilized bone except for the real dino bones I have from the Hell Creek Formation, I would appreciate any sharing of knowledge that you guys and gals may have in what to look for in that area - @old dead things 1 2 3 4 5

Hello fossil folks! I am going through my bone collection from last season and would like to identify the five bones pictured. The most interesting one to me is #5 as I believe it is too long to be a horse. Perhaps camel? All of these bones were collected from a river in central Iowa. So far, my wife and I have found prehistoric bison, horse, sloth, mastodon and mammoth bones from the pleistocene period. I am pretty sure these are either Metacarpal or Metatarsal bones. Sorry but I do not have a metric scale for the pictures. I have labeled the bones 1 thru 5 and noted each bone length. Thank you!