A Fossiliferous Week in the Midwest

[connorp]

This weekend, I have to drive up to Michigan to finish moving out of my apartment since I graduated, so I thought I would hit up a couple spots along the way. I'll hopefully have plenty of pictures to post here, but my fossil-filled week began earlier than expected so I'll start with that. I couldn't sleep much yesterday and ended up getting up way too early, so I figured I would go check out a Middle Devonian spot (Milwaukee Formation) in SE Wisconsin. I think this spot is pretty well known, so I wasn't expecting to find much. The fauna is pretty similar to what I find in the Silica Shale in Ohio but not as well preserved, so I didn't collect that much as I will be hunting the Silica Shale this weekend.

 

The location is quite scenic, and I spent a lot of my time hiking the trails.

 

Along the trails are a few outcrops, including one that appeared to only have been recently exposed from a tree falling. Unfortunately, most were poorly fossiliferous at best.

 

It seemed like a lot of fossils were concentrated in what are perhaps storm deposits, but these were in the middle of massive dolomite beds and were not worth the effort.

 

I only found one outcrop that was really worth exploring. I think only surface collecting is allowed, not that I would want to bust out a sledge next to hikers and fishermen anyways. The best collecting seemed to be from the more fossiliferous Lindwurm member. The underlying Berthelet is much more thickly bedded and formed a natural ledge for the Lindwurm to collapse onto.

[connorp]

A lot of what I found was pretty weathered, I assume from the river action. Brachiopods, bryozoans, and crinoid ossicles were the most common finds. Some of the less common fauna were tentaculitids and fragmentary trilobite remains. So pretty standard Devonian fauna.

 

But just as I was about to leave, I came across one of my bucket list fossils – my first placoderm fossil! To be precise, I believe it is a Ptyctodus dental plate.

 

I think this is the chewing surface. Pretty similar to the holocephalian crusher teeth I find in the Pennsylvanian, but it seems that these similarities are just superficial.

 

So in all a quite good day. Stay tuned for a couple more adventures.

[DeepTimeIsotopes]

Very nice finds! Even weathered the fossils are beautiful! 

[Fossildude19]

Great report and finds!  

 

@jdp  @Archie

[Peat Burns]

13 hours ago, connorp said:

 

I think this is the chewing surface. Pretty similar to the holocephalian crusher teeth I find in the Pennsylvanian, but it seems that these similarities are just superficial.

[smt126]

I take it you were at Estabrook?

[RuMert]

Nice finds and scenery

[Monica]

I echo what RuMert has said - great finds and beautiful scenery.

 

That dental plate is awesome, by the way!!!

[Archie]

Great finds and what a beautiful place to hunt! The placoderm tooth is so cool, its quite similar in some ways to some of the teeth of the Copodontiformes.

[deutscheben]

Excellent find! I love how well-preserved the cutting/chewing edge is, it's very evocative. I look forward to the rest of your report. 

[jdp]

Very nice gnathal plate!