MarcoSr Posted September 7, 2020 Author Share Posted September 7, 2020 10 hours ago, digit said: Very nice! Excellent opportunity to have a geologist that makes house calls. Cheers. -Ken Ken The geologist researcher has spent a lot of time with both the Chadron and Brule Formations so he is very familiar with the different formation layers. He wanted to make sure that he had the right time-frame for each of the 19 areas of the ranch that the specimens came from for his paper. His geologic findings will also be of great use to the other researchers. I google searched to check for graphics showing the Chadron and Brule formations, their time-frames, where the Orellan age of mammals was placed, etc. Everything that I looked at was slightly different. What really caused most of the differences was the fact that early researchers used the types of fossils found in the layers to originally date the layers. Later geologists used the layer composition and different dating techniques and discovered that some of the layers were older than originally thought. So with the confusion on the layer dating, it was really great to get a geologist familiar with the latest layer time-frames to visit the anthill sites. Marco Sr. 1 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digit Posted September 7, 2020 Share Posted September 7, 2020 I can understand the reason for the confusion between using index fossils and other dating techniques. Best way of clearing this up was to have an expert with boots on the ground at the site. Glad that there is such interest in the wealth of fossil material that you've recovered that someone was motivated to give the M&M Ranch such a great geologic assessment. Hope your sons learned some useful new information about their local geology. Cheers. -Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted September 8, 2020 Author Share Posted September 8, 2020 14 hours ago, digit said: I can understand the reason for the confusion between using index fossils and other dating techniques. Best way of clearing this up was to have an expert with boots on the ground at the site. Glad that there is such interest in the wealth of fossil material that you've recovered that someone was motivated to give the M&M Ranch such a great geologic assessment. Hope your sons learned some useful new information about their local geology. Cheers. -Ken Ken My sons actually learned a lot about the geology of the ranch. As examples, two small areas that we knew were Eocene but seemed out of place with the immediate surrounding deposits were Eocene channel deposits and a surface layer in the flats in the front part of the ranch was really Eocene, instead of Oligocene as we had thought, based upon the new dating of the layers. Marco Sr. "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted September 11, 2021 Author Share Posted September 11, 2021 Below is a recent update, from Dr. Clint Boyd, on the status of the mammal paper being written by Dr. Clint Boyd, Dr. William Korth, and Dr. Deborah Anderson on the mammal micro specimens that I donated from the M&M Ranch back in 2016/2017. Originally there were going to be multiple papers, but the researchers are now combining the rodents, insectivores, marsupials and carnivores into one combined paper. Covid did slow this paper down significantly, but progress is now being made. Sounds like this will be a significant paper. I'm not really sure where you publish such a large paper. "In terms of the paper on the current sites, Bill Korth just emailed me yesterday to say he is about done with the sorting, identifying, describing, and figuring of that material. The paper currently stands at about 180 manuscript pages, and he has identified 70 species so far. I’ll get you an updated faunal list when I have one. Several new species. The descriptive part of the paper will be the largest part, but we will now need to finish up the introduction, geology, and interpretation, which will take some work still. Our hope is to have it finished up this fall or winter to send out for review. I’ll keep you updated on progress as it goes." I recently sent (August 2021) additional micro mammal specimens from the ranch (from high up in the buttes which are later Oligocene) to these researchers which will be the subject of a future paper. Marco Sr. 3 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpc Posted September 11, 2021 Share Posted September 11, 2021 I look forward to seeing Korth's paper on these things. Thanks for theupdate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted September 12, 2021 Author Share Posted September 12, 2021 12 hours ago, jpc said: I look forward to seeing Korth's paper on these things. Thanks for theupdate. I had tried to get Dr. Korth to look at these mammal specimens back in 2016, but he didn't have the time then. He did look at my TFF posts on the micro specimens from the M&M Ranch and gave me some IDs from the pictures. However, he later retired and then got bored and luckily Dr. Boyd and Dr. Anderson were able to get him involved with my micro mammal specimens. Dr. Korth is definitely an expert researcher on White River Badlands mammals, and I was extremely happy when he got involved and took the lead on the paper. Marco Sr. 2 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ParkerPaleo Posted September 13, 2021 Share Posted September 13, 2021 I'm very interested to see this research as well. I'll be watching for it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted September 14, 2021 Author Share Posted September 14, 2021 12 hours ago, ParkerPaleo said: I'm very interested to see this research as well. I'll be watching for it. I'll try to update this post, especially if the paper gets to a publisher and is accepted for publication. Marco Sr. 1 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fossil_Adult Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 Wow that’s a huge step. Congratulations on getting these potentially published! I love watching your videos on YouTube you pull some big megs! I’m on a gap year semester out at sea in Massachusetts and I’m planning to scoop sediments off the bottom of the sea floor off the coast of Massachusetts (above a few geologically interesting areas) in hopes of analyzing some micro fossils and maybe even scooping up a Meg (probably won’t happen) but anyways congrats man I really look forward to reading that paper! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 20 hours ago, Fossil_teenager said: Wow that’s a huge step. Congratulations on getting these potentially published! I love watching your videos on YouTube you pull some big megs! I’m on a gap year semester out at sea in Massachusetts and I’m planning to scoop sediments off the bottom of the sea floor off the coast of Massachusetts (above a few geologically interesting areas) in hopes of analyzing some micro fossils and maybe even scooping up a Meg (probably won’t happen) but anyways congrats man I really look forward to reading that paper! Thank you. Hopefully your sediments contain lots of micro fossils. Please post what you find. The YouTube videos were made by my son Mel. He's collecting the Cretaceous of South Dakota and the Eocene/Oligocene of Nebraska these days, as he now lives in South Dakota. Marco Sr. 1 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted January 24, 2022 Author Share Posted January 24, 2022 One of the mammal researchers who is studying the mammal specimens from the anthills in the flats of the M&M Ranch had asked if we could try to get mammal specimens from the high buttes of the ranch. He had said that little was known about the mammals from that Oligocene time period. Marco Jr. collected matrix from 10 anthill sites in these buttes during his October 2021 trip to the ranch and brought the matrix back for me. It took 3 months for me to search and pull the fossil specimens from this anthill matrix. I just sent these mammal specimens today to the researcher. All these specimens will be donated to the ND Heritage Center and State Museum. Pictures of the nicer mammal specimens from each of the 10 anthill sites are below. Some anthills were much more productive than others, as can be seen in the below pictures. I also sent many more broken specimens and bone fragments from each anthill site. Marco Sr. 2 3 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpc Posted January 24, 2022 Share Posted January 24, 2022 these things are so much fun Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digit Posted January 24, 2022 Share Posted January 24, 2022 Very cool! Quite prolific some of those mounds. I recognize some of those types of fossils (especially the rodents) that I see on occasion in some of the Florida micro-matrix. Cheers. -Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted January 25, 2022 Author Share Posted January 25, 2022 2 hours ago, digit said: Very cool! Quite prolific some of those mounds. I recognize some of those types of fossils (especially the rodents) that I see on occasion in some of the Florida micro-matrix. Cheers. -Ken Rodent specimens are very common in the anthill matrix from the M&M Ranch. Marco Sr. "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted January 25, 2022 Author Share Posted January 25, 2022 4 hours ago, jpc said: these things are so much fun I do enjoy collecting and searching the anthill matrix from the M&M Ranch. However, I have a height phobia, so there is no way I would climb into the high buttes to collect those anthills. Luckily, Marco Jr. was willing to collect the high butte anthill matrix for me. Marco Sr. "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digit Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 19 minutes ago, MarcoSr said: high butte anthill matrix Now that's the best band name I've heard today. I believe you've mentioned before that you've had geologists out to the ranch to get a handle on ages of the various exposures. Are you collecting ant hill matrix from a variety of formations? I guess I'd expect the "high buttes" to be producing younger materials than ant hills lower down in the ranch. Cheers. -Ken Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted January 25, 2022 Author Share Posted January 25, 2022 10 minutes ago, digit said: Now that's the best band name I've heard today. I believe you've mentioned before that you've had geologists out to the ranch to get a handle on ages of the various exposures. Are you collecting ant hill matrix from a variety of formations? I guess I'd expect the "high buttes" to be producing younger materials than ant hills lower down in the ranch. Cheers. -Ken The M&M Ranch has two formations, the Eocene Chadron Formation and the Oligocene Brule Formation. The flats of the ranch have upper Chadron Formation and lower Brule Formation. Either side of the contact of these two formations is of special interest to the researchers. The high buttes are younger Brule Formation and represent a portion of the Oligocene that not much is known about because it isn't often exposed. So the researchers are really interested in specimens from the high buttes. For the mammal paper in progress on the mammal specimens from the flats of the M&M Ranch, the geologist researcher will discuss the ranch stratigraphy, including the different members of the Chadron and Brule Formations in the flats at each of the anthill sites on the ranch. Marco Sr. "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
digit Posted January 25, 2022 Share Posted January 25, 2022 Nice! Sounds like both elevations/formations have something to offer researchers--how fortuitous! Cheers. -Ken 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted February 11, 2022 Author Share Posted February 11, 2022 I just received via e-mail the below update from one of the mammal researchers: "We’ve looked at the insectivores, rodents, leporids, carnivores, and artiodactyls for this study (pretty much everything we had tooth wise from mammals). We’ve identified 82 taxa (not all to the species level, some to genus, and a few to family level) from the full fauna. This includes 10 new species and four new genera at this point (could still change a little before publication, of course). The current draft of the paper is 310 manuscript pages, not counting nearly fifty figures. It's going to be a standalone issue of the journal Paludicola this year, likely late spring or summer. That’s the goal, anyway. I’m putting the finishing touches on the full draft at the moment, then it will go to Deborah for a final set of edits before going out to reviewers. The additional material you sent us from the upper mounds will be a separate, follow-up paper. Otherwise, we’ll just keep adding to this first paper and never finish. Just wanted to let you know we’re working hard on these specimens and getting some really amazing results." When I started this project I was really hoping that there might be a new mammal species or if really lucky two new species. But 10 new mammal species and 4 new mammal genera is way above what I had hoped for. Marco Sr. 1 8 "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJ Posted February 11, 2022 Share Posted February 11, 2022 Outstanding news, Marco! 1 The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true. - JJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpc Posted February 11, 2022 Share Posted February 11, 2022 Bravo Marco Sr!!! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randyw Posted February 11, 2022 Share Posted February 11, 2022 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fossilhunter21 Posted February 12, 2022 Share Posted February 12, 2022 Conratulations, Marco! That is awesome news! -@fossilhunter21 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Dente Posted February 12, 2022 Share Posted February 12, 2022 Great news! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcoSr Posted February 12, 2022 Author Share Posted February 12, 2022 On 2/11/2022 at 4:11 PM, JohnJ said: Outstanding news, Marco! 23 hours ago, jpc said: Bravo Marco Sr!!! 22 hours ago, Randyw said: 20 hours ago, fossilhunter21 said: Conratulations, Marco! That is awesome news! -@fossilhunter21 11 hours ago, Al Dente said: Great news! Thank you. I'm really looking forward to the publication. Marco Sr. "Any day that you can fossil hunt is a great day." My family fossil website Some Of My Shark, Ray, Fish And Other Micros My Extant Shark Jaw Collection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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