Legendary Week

[Captcrunch227]

Two hunts, two creeks, 

two legendary finds in one week. 

 

I don’t know what you know about Texas weather, but in July it’s hot. Downright miserable, unsafe heat at times. Just a week and a half ago we hit a heat index of 111 degrees. So when you have a day that tops out in the mid 90s for a high, you take advantage of that cool front. 

 

I checked the weather and saw that Tuesday had a high of only 94. I messaged my buddy @sharko69 and said, “Hey, its gonna be a nice day. Let’s do some hunting this afternoon after work.” So we meet up at our usual hunting spot and he shows me a new drop in that I had yet to explore. So we drop in and right away I spot a Ptychodus whipplei tooth coming out of the wall. Woohoo! I’m on the board! Not a bad start. So we head upstream walking through knee high water, boots sinking in the silt, and the occasional game of limbo as we climbed under fallen trees. All the while taking great caution. On his scouting trip to this spot my friend saw a slide mark on the muddy bank. Was it crocodile or beaver? A crocodile in a creek in north Texas would be highly unusual, so we hedged our bets on the laws of probability. After all, fortune favors the brave right? Still I did desire to return home to my family that night, so we were on high alert. 

 

Then we arrived at our destination; the place looked almost heavenly. An enormous gravel bar stood before us, we knew it had to contain something wonderful, but would we find it?

 

Fast forward to an hour later, the only thing I’ve found since my Ptychodus are mosquitoes. Oh and the breeze stopped, so now it’s hot-ish, humid, and still. But I’m focused and press on despite feeling like I’m in an oven. After a while I found another shark tooth. Squalicorax, one of my favorites. Nice.  My friend and I are chatting and he walks over to show me his find, a nice Cretalamna tooth. As he leaves I scoot over to continue my search and right behind his steps lay a sight unlike any other. A black, deeply striated, and large tooth. I jump up speechless and throw my hands on my head. I turned away and had to do a double take. Surely I can’t have seen what I just saw. Yup, I did. A beautiful Pliosaur tooth was waiting right there atop the gravel pile. My friend sees my silent commotion and bolts over. He starts yelling, jumping up and down, and freaking out, just like I am on the inside. I gently pull it out and it’s in wonderful shape and it even has some of the root still attached. 

 

To put this in perspective finding a Pliosaur fossil here is insanely rare. While I don’t know the exact number I can virtually guarantee that the number of Pliosaur teeth found here in north Texas in the last decade is in the single digits. My friend found one just two weeks prior in the same creek and back then I thought I had seen the only Pliosaur tooth I would ever see. Boy was I glad to be so wrong. 

 

The rest of the hunt after that is somewhat of a blur. I found a few more shark teeth, a tennis ball sized piece of coprolite, oh and a smile that I’ll have to have surgically removed from my face. 

 

 

Fast forward a few days to Friday night. My friends sends me a picture of a monster 2-1/4" shark tooth he found from a new creek earlier that day. Wanna join me early tomorrow morning to hit up the spot some more? Pssh, does a fat puppy hate fast cars? Of course I do! So the alarm goes off at 6 am and I successfully beat the sun out of bed for today's hunt. After a cup of joe I hop into the car and begin the trek. We meet up in an empty parking lot, it looks like we're spies out for a super secret rendezvous or up to some type of nefarious behavior. But the only nefarious behavior that was happening that day was.... well actually none at all. Just a nice fossil hunt, social distancing style.

 

We drop into the site and get to work. Unlike last time where I found something immediately we were held to a big fat goose egg for quite a while. A solid hour or more. "Boy I'm not finding anything." "Yeah me neither." 30 seconds later i hear behind me, "Oh heck yeah!" I turn around to see my buddy holding a nice segment of Mosasaur jaw. Missing the tooth sadly, but a heck of a find nonetheless. Well, it's good to know that they're out here, but I just can't believe they're all scurrying away once I get close to them. So I continue to search.

 

Fun fact about my buddy @sharko69. He is a master Ptychodus hunter. He's so gifted in fact, that I have accused him of selling his soul to the devil. And that in return he was given the power that whenever he walks by a Ptychodus tooth, it just hops up into his pocket. The verdict is still out on that accusation.

 

So he tells me, "I have yet to find a Ptychodus yet here." So they must not be here, it's the only logical explanation given his power. So imagine my surprise when I looked down and saw a gorgeous Ptychodus latissimus tooth. I'm not getting shutout today! Whoop whoop! We press on and for another 30 minutes, nothing more is found except for a ton of broken and busted up septarian nodules. These dirty rotten tricksters are littered all over the creek. They constantly tempt us into thinking they're something cool, only to be let down yet again.

 

I look down towards the water and see what looks like another septarian nodule. "Not fooling me this time" I say to myself. I look away, but as I do I instantly stop and look back. Something seemed odd about that one. I approach it and I freeze. I say out loud to my buddy who's standing next to me but facing the other way, "There's no way this is what I think it is." He turns around and shouts out, "YES IT IS!" I reach down and pull it out. What I hold in my shaking hands is a stack of associated Xiphactinus vertebrae. 2 complete vertebrae, half of a third, and a tiny piece of a fourth. They're resting nicely in a perfectly flat piece of matrix, almost as if mother nature herself carved it out for a perfect display base.

 

The rest of the trip continued uneventfully for me for another couple hours. Yielding to me "only" an additional Squalicorax tooth. On the way back my friend pulls out yet another 2-1/4" tooth. His fifth tooth near or above the 2 inch mark in a week. (I meanwhile have yet to join the 2" club, but it's something I'm working on). At least with this find I can confirm that he is not bringing them from home and planting them and is indeed finding them.

 

So that capped off a week in which I found two legendary once in a lifetime finds. It was a fun week filled with mild-ish weather, fun times spent with the Prince of Ptychodus, and brilliant one of a kind fossils.

 

But I think the greatest treasure of all, was that of the deeply forged bond of friendship through the medium of fossicking.

 

 

TLDR; Found two cool fossils.

[Jackson g]

I wish our gravel bars here in Missouri had these awesome Cretaceous fossils you found. Hoping I can hunt in texas next month, or in September! The connected vertebrae are so cool!! Until then, I am 

[Monica]

Thanks for the great story - you had me on the edge of my seat!

 

Congratulations on your two out-of-this-world finds!!! 

[ThePhysicist]

Absolutely amazing finds! That pliosaur tooth...just awesome. 

[Captcrunch227]

2 hours ago, Jackson g said:

I wish our gravel bars here in Missouri had these awesome Cretaceous fossils you found. Hoping I can hunt in texas next month, or in September! The connected vertebrae are so cool!! Until then, I am 

I’m sorry to hear that. Yeah it sure is nice having places to hunt. You really have to work for it though. I just enjoy being outdoors though. A guy I know has a saying, fossil hunting is just hiking with a purpose. 
 

Good luck on your hunts down when you get down here! Many options around here in North Texas. 

[Captcrunch227]

1 hour ago, Monica said:

Thanks for the great story - you had me on the edge of my seat!

 

Congratulations on your two out-of-this-world finds!!! 

I’m glad you enjoyed it and replied that you did. You always wonder if it was worth the time to sit down and type it all out lol. 

[Captcrunch227]

1 hour ago, ThePhysicist said:

Absolutely amazing finds! That pliosaur tooth...just awesome. 

Thank you. Yeah the Pliosaur tooth is incredible. That is the first ever BIG find I’ve had so it has a special place in my heart. 

[Phevo]

Great narrative and nice to see insitu pictures aswell

[LSCHNELLE]

Amazing associated vertebrae! Really nice Pliosaur tooth.  For us Ptychodus people, can we see a pic of your P. lattissimus? 

[PaleoNoel]

That pliosaur tooth is amazing!

[Captcrunch227]

1 hour ago, Phevo said:

Great narrative and nice to see insitu pictures aswell

Thank you! Yeah I first saw the in situ pics here on the hunting trips forum and thought it was genius. I’ve been absolutely hooked doing it ever sense. 

[Captcrunch227]

42 minutes ago, PaleoNoel said:

That pliosaur tooth is amazing!

Thank you! It’s one of the Crown Jewels of my collection

[PrehistoricWonders]

Gorgeous tooth and great verts!!! I found some verts similar to yours a couple weeks ago but it was three full with no third and they were shark instead of fish!!! Here’s a picture of mine!

[Captcrunch227]

58 minutes ago, Familyroadtrip said:

Gorgeous tooth and great verts!!! I found some verts similar to yours a couple weeks ago but it was three full with no third and they were shark instead of fish!!! Here’s a picture of mine!

Those are gorgeous! Congrats! I just love associated verts. 

[HemiHunter]

That story was so much fun to read!  I felt like I was there with you. INCREDIBLE pliosaur tooth!  Congratulations!

[sharko69]

Was another fun trip. I am glad that sites I have taken you to have produced. I think hunting with somebody helps all parties to stay more focused. We have found some killer stuff the last few weeks and I look forward to future trips with you after some rains and cooler weather. I am still just a little envious of those verts. If I had just taken two more steps....

[Captcrunch227]

Stopped my friends at PaleoTex today and they did a bit of prep work on my verts. They look even better now. Here’s some before and after pics. 
 

 

[Captcrunch227]

8 hours ago, sharko69 said:

Was another fun trip. I am glad that sites I have taken you to have produced. I think hunting with somebody helps all parties to stay more focused. We have found some killer stuff the last few weeks and I look forward to future trips with you after some rains and cooler weather. I am still just a little envious of those verts. If I had just taken two more steps....

It really has been a fun few weeks. Yeah being with another person I definitely seem to find more and better things. 
 

Funny you said that, I was thinking the same thing about that monster Cretodus you pulled. Just a few more steps lol

[Captcrunch227]

On 7/29/2020 at 12:38 PM, HemiHunter said:

That story was so much fun to read!  I felt like I was there with you. INCREDIBLE pliosaur tooth!  Congratulations!

Thank you! I’m glad you enjoyed the story. 

[Sjfriend]

Great trip report and even better finds! I too wish we had better vertebrate fossils up here we'd be allowed to keep

[NSRhunter]

Great finds, gotta love D*****, I hunt there myself a bit   The creeks cut through the Eagle Ford and Austin so you get a neat mix of stuff. 

[fossilsonwheels]

Great finds Beau !! 

[FossilNerd]

On 7/28/2020 at 9:45 PM, Captcrunch227 said:

A guy I know has a saying, fossil hunting is just hiking with a purpose. 
 

That is my new favorite line; that I will shamelessly use when I get strange looks from family and friends after telling them I am going fossil hunting. Now it's hiking with a purpose! 

 

Great story and incredible finds! Those associated verts are drool inducing! 

[LSCHNELLE]

Captcrunch227 - 

"So imagine my surprise when I looked down and saw a gorgeous Ptychodus latissimus tooth. I'm not getting shutout today! Whoop whoop!" 

 

I love especially this part of the story.  Captcrunch227, can you post a picture of the P. latissimus? 

[siteseer]

On 7/29/2020 at 8:49 PM, Captcrunch227 said:

It really has been a fun few weeks. Yeah being with another person I definitely seem to find more and better things. 
 

Funny you said that, I was thinking the same thing about that monster Cretodus you pulled. Just a few more steps lol

 

You and Sharko69 found some great stuff, Captain.  Also, I was always told the "buddy system" is the rule in fossil hunting just in case of a problem.  I know a lot of people like to go "lone wolf" but it is a good idea to go with a friend.

 

Jess