Help Identify

[moose1170]

Found in Big Brook, NJ

[Harry Pristis]

Looks like a deer calcaneum.

 

 

[moose1170]

Thank you! Any idea on the age? I’m pretty new to this.

[Shellseeker]

Welcome to the forum, Moose..

It is either a modern bone or a rock hard fossil. The fossil process takes more than 10000 years. Looks like a fossil to me...

[digit]

Welcome to the forum! As you can see we have a wealth of knowledge and a great membership willing to share.

 

If you had found an item from something that is extinct and no longer roaming the planet (a megalodon shark, mammoth, T-rex, etc.) you would know for sure that your find was not modern but certainly a fossil. When you find something from a species that is still extant then you have to determine if it is modern or much older. We have issues here in Florida when we find things like deer, alligator or turtle as these species are represented in the fossil record as well as being present in the present.

 

From what I know about the Big Brook, NJ area which is, admittedly, very little, most of the fossils found there tend to be of Cretaceous age which is way before deer would have been around. But a bit of searching on the internet seems to indicate that Pleistocene fossils might be found in the creeks in addition to those from the Cretaceous so it could well be fossilized. The astragalus is brown so we know it is not very modern. A fossilized (permineralized) bone should be heavier than modern (unfossilized) bone. Kinda tricky to gauge as people don't usually have a good feel for how heavy a deer astragalus should be but you might be able to determine if it feels heavy for its size. If it feels very light then there might be a chance that it is indeed relatively modern. One fairly good test to excluding modern bones is to check and see if there is any collagen left in the bone matrix. This is easier than it sounds. Bone is a combination of calcium and phosphate in a matrix of protein (mainly collagen). If you hold a bone that still has this protein in its matrix over a flame (candle/lighter) and you smell a disgusting smell like hair being burnt then there is still protein in the bone and it is relatively modern. A completely mineralized (fossil) bone will no longer have any protein and will produce no stink when passed through a flame momentarily.

 

Let us know how heavy the bone feels and, if you decide to give it the flame test, how that turns out.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken