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Showing results for tags 'shale'.
Found 277 results
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Thought i'd ask about an area I revisited to see if it seems like a good spot to start looking for fossils. It's a mine dump, most of it seems to be shale I think (is it?) Means I don't I have to dig, but most of it is pretty shattered.
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Hi all, This specimen was found in a black shale layer that lays directly and uncomfortably upon the Duquesne Limestone, which is Late Pennsylvanian age. It was found in the suburbs of Pittsburgh. Both the shale and limestone are filled with vertebrate fossils, especially the scales, teeth and spines of paleoniscoid fish. As far as I know there is no species list from the shale but Elonichthys has been reported. I know skull roofs can be very diagnostic so any rough estimates of genus would be very helpful! I apologize for the picture quality, my phone is a brick.
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This rock was found in Upstate New York, almost certainly in Devonian shale. It looks sort of like a footprint, but I wasn’t aware that large dinosaurs even existed in the Devonian, so it is dubious. Any opinions? Thanks, Evan.
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Here’s some fossils I’m working on from 18 mile creek in Hamburg,NY. They’re in pretty dense hard silica shale. Any ideas on identifying them?
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I had my first taste of the Carboniferous period. I made the trip to Centralia PA for a look at the fossils there. I went to coal deposit up the road from the cemetery on 2nd street ( pic below ). Centralia was not a "ghost town" not when I was there. There was a lot of people around. Many looked like they where their for the Graffiti Highway and other for some kind of four wheel event across the street from the spot I was at. The Shale was very soft and I had a hard time picking up anything bigger than 2 inches. I pulled away 3 layer but still had the same problem. I don't know if it would be them same if a kept going. Over all the sit was easy to find, and had a good view. With many fossil to pick from.
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Some goodies from the last few monthes (Trilobites heavy topic)
elcoincoin posted a topic in General Fossil Discussion
Hi all, I have been more or less away from the forum for the last few monthes. Life has been hectic. And if i still managed to go on the field quite a lot, i did have any time left for the rest (writing, taking photos, processing stuff, labelling etc). Nevertheless, i finally manage a quick photo session. As an appetizer, what is prolly the best piece for quite some time. A double trilo, Eodalmanitina sp, one preserved with his caudal spine. So 2 rocks as a starter . I had to sacrifice part of the 2 counterprints, to unveil the opposite trilo... Regards. -
Hello, I came across this trilobite after I had shale delivered from a local eastern panhandle WV quarry. It was found with several crinoid stems. Any help on ID would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
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Hello! I found this odd looking fossil the other day on a river bank in Toronto after splitting the shale. It seems to be possibly be a coal imprint of some sort. Not too sure what it might be. Let me know what you guys think: Thanks for the help!! -Em
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Today I went down to fossil hunt in Tully, New York. I stumbled across this and thought it was a horn coral, but I hadn’t been finding any corals. I had been finding a bunch of crinoids so I was considering a crinoid calyx, but I still had no clue. Any insights are greatly appreciated!!!
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This summer I was once again able to look for fossils near Newberry, MI in a degrading hill filled with drift. In my research recently, I came across a paper on the Collingwood formation drift in Newberry, and was excited to find exact descriptions of some of the layered rocks found there. I am including photos of one of them, split into its layers...and the orthocones revealed in thos layers. The orthocone has a very thin shell of some kind....they are always found flattened and usually with that line down the center indicating what was once rounded has been squished flat. In the 4.5 " orthocone showing (the third image and about 6" overall) even the open edge presents a somewhat curved opening. usually it is squared across. Over the years I have found these triangular shaped creatures filling the shale...from 1/4 " long smattering of them all over a hashplate, to the ones that average 4 or so inches. I have not been able to figure them them out. The interesting paper I read doesn't mention them, which was a surprise to me since they are so plentiful. At any rate, If someone has a suggestion I would appreciate it. The other thing I am curious about, is the geologic process that formed this rock...for each of them, the split layers reveal creatures...in one of my rocks, each layer is filled with graptolites. So what was the process by which the layers formed....rain storms that roiled the sediment and trapped a layer of animal...followed by a week or month or day or year storm that layered another 1/2 inch of sediment and captured another layer of creatures....and how did this layer than get broken up into cobbles....(the animal remains found in each of the layers sames to be consistent with all the other layers of each, so I am assuming a rather quick succession of silt was laid down....in a somewhat regular pattern.
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Hello everyone, I've had a lifelong passion for fossils but I'm a relative newbie to collecting, having only done it for the last 3 years. Most of my previous fossil-collecting trips were in NC, where you find sharks teeth and shells by sifting through creeks or looking through mine deposits. I know very little about how people do it out west, which has turned out to be a big problem. On a recent vacation to Colorado, I looked around Florissant Fossil Beds and also ordered a shipment of fossils from the quarry. The shipments arrived about a week ago, and there's some pretty interesting imprints on the surface some of the rocks, namely possible Sequoia and Cedrelospermum, as well as another rounded leaf. I got an X-Acto 1 knife and started splitting yesterday. The problem is, even though I'm trying to follow the instructions of the sheet sent with the fossils, I haven't found many fossils, and worse yet I've accidentally lopped off the tops of the sequoia and Cedrelospermum leaves (it's nothing a little superglue can't fix, but still). The remaining parts of the leaves are also in a very precarious position: they are on very thin layers and I can't continue splitting the shale without possibly causing damage to them. I'll share pictures later. People who've successfully found fossils at Florissant, what are your secrets to finding things and not causing damage to fossils that are in the same rock that you're splitting?
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I have several good Eldredgeops rana specimens from Penn Dixie Fossil Park, and they were fairly clean when I hacked them out. Unfortunately, there is a lot of shale stubbornly stuck in the groves and crevasses of the trilobites. I have access to a dental sandblaster, but I'm not sure if it's safe to use. Any thoughts?
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This is a very large boulder and it is layered. I took off a few layers and found nothing. I was wondering how old this boulder is and should I keep digging into it. Thanks for your help in advance.
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@piranha @GerryK Can anyone confirm this is Paladin transilis? I found this in the Carboniferous of Illinois. Not sure if they've ever been described here...... And yes it's preserved in pyrite.
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This may be a silly question, but how do I know if something is actually a fossil or just a weird shaped rock? Also, if anyone knows - how do these weird shaped rocks form in the slate/shale if they aren't fossils? Not looking for an ID (yet!), just trying to figure out how all the weirdly shaped rocks came to be! I went hiking with my mom in our backyard because she found what we believe to be nautiloid fragments (link to ID thread) and we wanted to see if we could get more. Well we found lots of oddly shaped rocks, but are unsure if they are actually anything. If it helps, we are in a creek in Groveland, Livingston County, New York. A geologist friend said that creek bed looks like shale slate. The only thing we pulled out that I have pictures of right now is a long wormy looking one. One picture of it in the rock and three after we got it out. I haven't been able to take any pictures with size reference sorry I don't have it with me right now, but from memory I'd estimate it's at least ~12-15 cm (5-6 inches). Thanks!
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Novice to identifying fossils, if there's a lower rung on the knowledge scale it would probably be more applicable. Found this about 30cm deep in north central West Virginia about 12 miles south of Cumberland MD. Our yard is about 10cm of topsoil and at least a meter of hard packed shale (that's as far down as I've had the pleasure of digging for my projects). I've found other similar items but this one split to show the interior which caught my interest.
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Tried a spot on the side of road suppositly devonion. Looking for trilobites or anything I could find. Never searched for them before. A little disappointed I did not see more fossils, even broken ones. I found a few very small possible fossils and an interesting rock that sparkled in the sun. Pic first not do justice.
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My wife and I had a nice trip around the eastern half of the country late May and all of June. Now that I am home, I am busy sorting fossils from various locations....Wax, Kentucky, Green Bay, Wi; Newberry Mich; Grand Haven, Mich. Kennebunk, Maine. Those were places I was able to stop for an hour or so at some locations. I'll give a synopsis another time. Today, I want to share one of my coolest fossils...I wanted to get home to photograph it better. The piece is only about 3/8" across, and 1 & 1/2 in long. It is a crinoid stem, encrusted in byrazoans all around the edge...but the coolest thing is its view from each end. they are quite different. At any rate, here are the cool end shots...
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I have no clue what this is. But I do know that it's middle devonian.
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Hey there, just moved to Charlotte area from up in CT. I got bit by the fossil bug bad up there in Little Falls NY, fell in love with trilobites and the "just one more." So, having just settled in, I am looking for places to go hunting nearby. I know there's a place in the Uwharrie to find petrified wood, and the eastern rivers have shale and fossil beds, but can't quite find any open or legal locations defined enough to be able to drive to them. In the rare case I can make it to the coast, I'll be beachcombing for hours if anyone can point me to a decent shoreline. I'm interested in any sites to go fossil digging, as well as anywhere to go rockhounding within 3-4 hours of Charlotte. There are so many mines just west of Charlotte that are just the sluice and "buy a bucket", or mines that seed the area with rocks from Brazil and such, I'm looking for a native-rock mine that gives a decent chance. I don't have any machinery (unless a metal detector and UV lamp counts), but I've done my time splitting shale/limestone, and have a good eye for tiny things. I like digging holes in debris piles, rainy days that make things shine, and meeting people covered in mud, doing crazy things just to find a really cool "rock". My move to NC has been amazing so far, everyone is so much less frenzied than up north, and y'all are great! If anyone can point me in a gps direction, thanks!
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I visited family in Oklahoma and collected some cool Stigmaria fossils and around 1500 lbs of rock for landscaping.
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- carboniferous
- stigmara
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Found the attached at Cory's Lane in Portsmouth RI. I have guesses as to its ID. Do you have any thoughts?
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Amateur fossil find 30 years ago leads to crucial evolutionary discovery today
OutrageousFennel posted a topic in Fossil News
A family of amateur fossil hunters from Utah -- the Gunthers -- found this fascinating fossil in the Spence Gulch shale part of Utah in 1992, and shared it with Richard Robison at the University of Kansas. The mystery of what it was went unsolved for nearly 30 years, until a team at Ohio State uncovered the telltale circle that showed the creature had attached to a shelly surface via a basal disc. It's the earliest/one of the earliest known specimens of a mat-sticker making the evolutionary move to attaching to a harder surface--a leap that makes some of our modern-day echinoderms, including sea cucumbers, possible. They recently published their findings in the Bulletin of Geosciences but this discovery wouldn't have been possible if the Gunthers hadn't found the fossil in the first place. Just fascinating stuff. (story here: https://news.osu.edu/scientists-discover-evolutionary-link-to-modern-day-sea-echinoderms/),-
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- haplophrentis reesei
- echinoderm
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Hello all. I had recently made a post needing to repair a fossil of ferns (Lygenopteris hoeninghousi) and an unknown branch. It is now repaired and I wanted to get a proper ID on the branch specifically and see what you all think it is from. Do you believe it is also from Lygenopteris hoeninghousi? I think the preserved hair like spines along the branch are particularly interesting. It was found in a coal mine in Alabama and is in shale. Thank you all.
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Hello all. I recently received a fossil branch in delicate shale. It wasn't packaged well and arrived broken. It is a shame. I want to know what the best way is to repair it and hide the cracks. The first picture is what it looked like before it was sent to me. Thank you! ps: if anyone knows what it is an ID would be appreciated as well, but my primary concern is the best way to repair it.
