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Hi all, I finally made the trek to Matoaka Beach, a fossil collecting site along the Calvert Cliffs on the Western Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. The beach is accessible to the public for $5 per person per day. Once we arrived, we reported to the front office where the property owner and his adorable newborn daughter were happy to collect our fee and give us access to the beach along with advice on how to best hunt the grounds. He advised us to head North (left of the entrance), which was what I had also read online. Apparently, the farther North you head, the better the fossils tend to be. So my dad and I made our way down the stairs to the foot of the cliffs, and began searching. The beach is very wide, so it's difficult to decide where to walk. I was finding fragments of Chesapectan shells left and right, but nothing quite worth keeping. But then, after maybe 5 minutes of hunting, I looked down at my feet and saw a large, complete, Ecphora staring back at me. I could hardly believe it. At a site where invertebrates dominate the matrix, a nice Ecphora is just about equivalent to finding a Megalodon tooth. And yes, I am aware that Meg teeth can be and have been found at this site before, but the find that I was after that day was certainly Ecphora. It was a gorgeous specimen, much larger and more complete than any other I'd found before. And there it was, just laying out in the open, a couple hundred yards from the entrance. I excitedly showed my dad the find, and promptly continued hunting, although I knew there was likely no beating what I had just found at the very beginning of the day. As I walked farther North, I marveled at the cliffs, which were absolutely chalk full of invertebrate fossils. It was incredible, and unlike anything I'd ever seen before. I kept finding crushed shells and small pieces of fossilized coral, but nothing spectacular. That is, until I stumbled upon the section of the beach where many huge chunks of the cliffs had fallen. I decided to look for large shells sticking out of the cliff falls, and very quickly discovered the best method for finding fossils at Matoaka. Immediately, I began finding giant Chesapectan every couple of inches in the cliff falls. After unearthing about a dozen, I decided to head North again to see if I could find another similar section. I walked at least a mile farther and found next to nothing, so I turned around and headed back towards the digging site. When I arrived, I saw that my dad has discovered the falls and was digging through them just as I had been. We both set down our gear and decided to spend the rest of our day there carefully excavating shells from the matrix. This was certainly different than the fossil hunting I've done in the past. It felt more like the traditional "dig site" hunting that most people think of when they think of a paleontologist or archaeologist. It was really cool. At one point, I saw a familiar spiral structure just poking out of one of the falls, and quickly recognized it as a small Ecphora. I plopped myself down on the ground next to it and spent the next 20 or so minutes cautiously excavating it. I foolishly forgot to bring a digging kit, so I resourcefully used broken fragments of sturdy shells around me to dig out the specimen. Although I chipped off a few pieces of it, I managed to extract it from the matrix mostly intact. With that, we headed back towards the entrance. We decided to sift for a bit to try for some shark teeth, and eventually I found one and my dad found three. Matoaka is unrivaled for invertebrate fossils along the Cliffs, but it's definitely not a top spot for teeth. Overall, I was incredibly pleased with my first trip to Matoaka Beach. From the friendly owners to the beautiful scenery and wildlife and the fantastic fossil finds, Matoaka Beach is a must for any fossil hunter in the DMV area. We ended up finding a ton of Chesapectan, ranging from "itty bitty" nearly the size of my hand, some stunning Ecphora, fossilized coral and barnacles, some Turritella, and a few shark teeth as well. I already can't wait to go back to Matoaka. Thanks for reading my report. Hoppe Hunting!

Went out after the snow here, not expecting much. Found a dozen or so small teeth (one small mako?), a flat (porpoise?) partially hollow tooth, some coral on a scallop, skate teeth and a nice piece of stinger, and-- finally-- a bunch of shrimp coprolite burrows (had not seen any in a longtime, but the storm deposited several; posted photo on that thread). Bunch of "whale' bone" chunks. A fun day.

Hey y'all! @Cris and I went out for another Megalodon Shark tooth hunt and I am happy to say the Fossil God's decided to bless me greatly, but unfortunately did not decide to bless Cris Now our friendship is on the line but I guess it is okay because I have fossils. Bahahaa! Check out the video if you're interested and get some time and if you wanna watch Cris try to steal my fossils. Such great times!

Took a trip to Matoaka Beach for the first time today. Alot of bivalves, barnacles, couple pieces of coral, and one snail. Here's a pic! No sharks teeth but I will keep trying! IMG_1322.HEIC

Hi folks - new to the forum. This is my very first post. I took the advice of fossil guy and checked out Matoaka Beach today. The temps were supposed to be warmer than usual. A little rainy. All of the rain we have had lately led me to believe there might be some wash outs along the cliff. Found several Chesapecten, coral, big barnacles, and clams. Below are pics of things I can't ID and was hoping for some help. Two pieces look like bone. Would love to get the forums thoughts!

After an extremely successful and enjoyable first trip to the Miocene of Virginia, my dad and I decided to give it another go when we saw that another guided trip was being held in late October. Our first trip resulted in my two biggest teeth ever, massive mako and huge hastalis. This time around, there weren't as many people on the trip, which is typically a good sign because it means less competition. The conditions, however, were brutal. It was very cold, and on top of that there were extremely fast gusting winds that made the river look more like an angry sea. Luckily, the tide was remarkably low while we were there, so there was a TON of ground to cover. I ventured south in search of some large shark teeth, and was successful to an extent. I talked with a woman who showed me a decent meg she had just found, but that was just about the best find I saw all day. Although I didn't come away with anything spectacular this time, I still got a respectable haul consisting of lots of hemis, some decent makos, a couple massive Chesapectan, and more of the typical Miocene finds. A big thank you to @SailingAlongToo again, for his instrumental role in organizing and supervising the trip. Already can't wait to head out again. I know there's a meg out there somewhere with my name on it. I'll find it one of these days. Thanks for reading! ~David

Hey y'all! @Cris and I just got out for another trip the other day. We went back to the same spot where that huge Meg came from in the last post I shared here. We ended up doing pretty dang good again with some really nice juvenile Megalodon teeth!

I went to Pohang (city of korea) yesterday to hunting fossils. this formation is a miocene bed that called Duho formation. it is famous for nice quality leafs, fish, crab, and even shark tooth. So, i was arrived here with a big dream... Actually i hadn't found something interesting in first 1 hour,,,,,,,,, only some part of leafs, little wood parts, and small plants. Because i couldn't find something unique, i came down from outcrop and cracked another boulder stone. But luck comes at that time! I found 30% of fossils in this picture in that stone. and i even found..... PERFECT pair leaf and FISHHHHHH!!! it is really hard to found 'animal' in this formation, but omg! i did. this fossil trip was so nice... I hope i could visit Pohang before all fossil - producing areas( in pohang) are destroyed.

Scientists dig into rich, remote Bullock Creek fossil site for first time in 16 years, By Jesse Thompson ABC Radio Darwin , Australia, November 24, 2018 https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-25/magnt-visits-bullock-creek-tanami-desert-fossil-site/10548238 Bullock Creek (Northern Territory) fossil site https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullock_Creek_(Northern_Territory) Yours, Paul H.

geerodenmamma{climatessoetholCE!!03.x.pdf A Miocene Rodent Nut Cache in coastal Dunes from the Miocene Lower Rhine Embayment,Germany Carole T.Gee,P.Martin Sander,B Petzelberger/Palaeontology 46/6-2003 Read this one a couple of days ago. Less than 2 Mb,and very highly recommended the authors link micromammal functional ecology,paleophytogeograpy,paleoclimate and stratigraphy in an engaging way

Had a southwest wind and a slight blowout tide (wind southwest). Found lots (30+) of small teeth in the 'wash' but nothing else but small whale bone pieces and some pottery shards (lots of rusted metal and glass as well along with glass and wood and leaves). Water was really cold. One decent (1 1/2") mako; although numbers were unusually good for the beach, nothing all that interesting or spectacular.

Hi! I always post specimens that may be just minerals... which are the real difficult ones for me to identify. I would like to ask you what do you think about this one. It was found near the other two specimens I posted before, one of them seem to be a baryte nodule and the other one we still do not know for sure. It was found in Santorcaz, NE Madrid province, Spain, in a site where miocene fossils have been found, and where we can still find many limestones which originated in an old lake. I think this may be... only may be... part of an actinocrinites called "calyx" (?). Thank you all!

Thinking about selecting a light sand color for the background to make these teeth pop. Here’s an evolutionary display of the Megalodon. Left-to-right: O. obliques, O. auriculatus, O. angustiden, O. chubutensis, O. megalodon. Notice the abscence of cusps from the Meg. The two right most teeth are from Calvert Cliffs, the two in the middle from South Carolina, and the far left from Morocco. FYI @Kurt Komoda @FossilSloth @caldigger @SailingAlongToo @Malcolmt

For your viewing pleasure I present one hundred cleaned and placed shark, pinniped, Cetacean, and ray teeth from Bakersfield. Tomorrow I’ll glue them to the back board with epoxy and have a label created at the very bottom. FYI @digit @Malcolmt @caldigger @Kurt Komoda @SailingAlongToo @WhodamanHD

Howling wind and deep ice cold water, but figured the creek bed would protect me from the wind (it did) and cold (not so much). Less hunters out. Don't usually post casts/steinkerns but this gastropod(?) has two small fossilized worm like things on it (probably need to get a better photo than the scan). All the rain has washed shells everywhere (lots of 5" to 7" scallops/ pectans everywhere; didn't see any whole ecphora, the only shells I usually pick up. Frilly oysters were everywhere as well; top half is neat). Most of the teeth I found was small or broken or both; three cow shark, one decent with root. Four(?) angelshark and several others, lots of spikes most missing their cusps, small triangular most with faint serrations, and a bunch of glossy drum teeth (photo is of the other side). Broken verts. When other stuff dries, may find something else interesting.

I spent a few hours fossil hunting on two separate trips on Forest Service land in Montana. The first trip was this past spring looking for Late Oligocene - Early Micoene flora about 90 minutes outside of Missoula. The second trip was during at stint over the summer at a fire lookout tower in the Flathead where I spent just a few hours one morning looking at Devonian and Mississippian marine layers. Besides the obvious, the trips were quite different. The spring trip was a drive to a road cut on a Forest Service road while the summer trip was a seven mile hike in. Additionally the medium is completely different; flakey, brittle shale compared with big, blocky limestone. You can keep non-vertebrate fossils as long as you don't plan to sell them. Prior to heading to an area, I look through publicly available research, lectures, field trips, etc. to find possible localities. I only found limited information on possible identification of the Late Oligocene - Early Micoene flora and most of if was unpublished graduate work from a nearby site with only some overlap on species. Please feel free to correct any id's or throw new ones out! I believe these are cercocarpus, a mahogany.

Hi, This tooth was found at Bayfront Park/Brownies Beach, which is Calvert Formation (~18-22 MYA). It is clearly from an odontocete, but it is unlike any other I've found from this location, or anywhere for that matter. The crown is not perfectly conical, instead having a rather wide appearance. But what really makes this tooth so odd is the root. It is flattened and bumpy, while most odontocete teeth have long, smooth roots like those of human teeth (this obviously makes sense, as they are both mammals). The fossil is about 3/4" from the tip of the crown to the bottom of the root. If you look closely (it may be difficult to see in the pictures provided), it almost looks like the tooth is encased within the root, and could be pulled out. This at first led me to consider the possibility that the strange flat part may actually just be matrix and the fossil is just a typical odontocete tooth not fully uncovered. However, after further inspection I am confident that everything is fossilized and the entire fossil is a single tooth. So now the only questions are what animal did this tooth belong to and why is it so unusual in appearance? I am certainly hoping that it may be a small Squalodon tooth because I've never found one and I think they're just awesome. Any information is appreciated, as always. Thank you!

Hi! This is another specimen I found next to the others I just posted. While the others are red and look like coral, this one looked to me as a skull at first glance. I collected it and I found out it had an intertesting soft texture over the hard stone when I started to clean it. I can say it is a bit like skin... so I stopped the cleaning process because it came off. It seems to be broken. Maybe an echinoid? The problem is always that the fossil may be really inside the matrix... Thanks!

Hi, I would like to ask you if you happen to know what these fossils are. They were found in central Spain, on a farm field that I have learned to be a not well-known Miocen limestone lacustrine site. It remineded me of petrified wood when I first saw it and then I thought it could be coral. However, if you look carefully you can see that it was possibly part of a rould-like creature as I could find several pieces that actually fit. As you can see, the creature was not all the same as part of the surface where the pieces seem to assemble look totally different. The surface is not perfectly round. Please let me know if you happen to know what it is. Thank you!

The weather has FINALLY cooled down here in Florida, and it is comfortable to dig like maniacs in the shallow fossil-bearing creeks. The mosquitoes, thunderstorms, and risk of heat stroke has finally subsided, so we went out to take advantage of the beautiful Florida winter and find some shark teeth! So @Cris and myself headed out to a trusty old site that we have not visited in a long time. Luckily, some recent rains have moved things around and we were able to find some untouched places. I ended up finding one of the nicest Megalodon shark teeth I have ever found in my life! Along with some other amazing juvenile Megalodon teeth, Mako's, and even a piece of Mastodon tooth! What an absolutely insane day. I still can't stop looking at the tooth!

Hello. I found this tooth today at Matoaka and wanted to get a different perspective than mine. This tooth seems way old for the Choptank formation. First, it seems like a Paleocene tooth snuck in to a Miocene formation. To me, it seems more like otodus obliqqus than hastalis. Reason? Cusps. My tooth has more pronounced, albeit worn down cusps than any I've seen on hastalis. All i'm trying to say is that it is very different and uncommon and would like to know what it is. Tooth.

So today I chose to go out to Matoaka. My parents and brother looked at me like I was crazy but I insisted upon going and I arrived. The beach was nice from the start. I found associated modern fish verts that connected somewhat into a tail shape, which was pretty cool. I proceeded along the beach, finding a tooth I want positive identification on that I'll post later on and some other cool teeth, including large Hemis and a Ecphora with only a small bit missing. The hunt itself wasn't as interesting as what happened next. After about an hour and a half of looking, we went back to our car to refuel. There we met Mr Bryan, a helper for the cabins. He had been fossil hunting down here for 4 months straight, and asked to see what I found. At this point, he slipped a very nice, large tooth into my collector without me noticing till later. He saw my Ecphora and asked if I wanted to see his collection. I obviously said yes. Mr Bryan had so many Ecphora, ranging from minuscule to the size of my palm, from dusky brown to brilliant orange, and offered me a few. His generosity was amazing. He also showed me the whale skull and associated verts he dug out of the St Mary's formation, and the crocodile vert from the same place. He showed me his collection of teeth, including megalodons and a crocodile tooth 2-3 inches long. The highlight of his collection was a fossilized crab he dug out of the cliffs, here, at Matoaka. It was a brilliant piece with claws intact and even places where the eye stalks attached. It was stunning detail, and he offered me a crab body very similar to his except missing the claws. His generosity was at breaking point when he offered me a crocodile tooth as well, albeit smaller than his highlight. He also offered to walk the cliffs with me if we send him notice and look for the best Ecphora. What a person. I couldn't say thanks enough. When we left, I purchased a nice 1 1/2 inch meg from the roadside stand for a steal. It was a great day. Crab: Croc Tooth