You gotta put in the time...

[digit]

For the last several weeks Tammy and I have been volunteer digging every Wednesday and Saturday at the Montbrook site a little south of Gainesville (FL) with the Florida Museum of Natural History (FLMNH). The weather called for continuous light drizzle all day yesterday (Saturday) so we bumped the dig day to today (Sunday) instead. Normally, Sunday and Monday are the non-digging days at the site but the other days are occupied by small groups of volunteers and site managers.

 

This morning was clear and cool with a steady breeze from the north. This meant several layers while packing up this morning and when we got to the site at 10am. The temps quickly rose throughout the morning and the layers of warm clothing were shed. Post-lunch it was quite warm with the sun beating down on your back and it was hard to fathom that it was actually chilly earlier in the day.

 

We were digging in the same grid squares that we'd been focusing on for the last couple of weeks. Underneath several highly visibly banded layers of sterile sand we dropped into a layer that was rich with a tangle of fossils. The foundation for this cluster of fossil goodness was a large pelvis from a gomphothere (a 4-tusked elephant relative that is reasonably common at the site). Wedged in around this large flat pelvic bone were a couple of Trachemys (slider) turtle shells which were badly crushed and so did not merit being preserved in a plaster jacket and instead were "chunked out" into several small bags to attempt to be re-assembled later in the warehouse (possibly by me).

 

We had started the morning by removing the plaster jacket that contained the majority of the gomph pelvis. There was more of this intermixed with other bones that will come out later as part of a jacket that might contain a pair of gator skulls--one in poor condition and one (underneath the pile-up) that might be in much nicer preservation that I discovered last week.

 

I spent the day working around this mountain of bones. Tammy was working an adjacent grid square leveling it down and working on some clusters of bones that had cropped out in that square. Richard Hulbert (collections manager at the FLMNH and well-known identifier of Florida finds) was working on a section of articulated alligator vertebrae that was found a few weeks back several grid squares to the south. The only other participant today was Jonathan Bloch the department chair and curator for vertebrate paleontology at the FLMNH. He had found a large gomphothere leg bone and was clearing the area around it to make a pedestal so that it could be jacketed for removal.

 

Most of the day was pretty run-of-the-mill for Montbrook. We pulled out lots of isolated Trachemys turtle shell pieces and random bits like gator vertebrae and teeth. These are the "background" fossils that are common at this site. Toward the end of the day Tammy pulled up an interesting bone that we had to pass around. From the size of it I guessed that it might be rhino and given the shape thought it might be something odd like a calcaneum or astragalus. When Richard had a look at it he confirmed that it was rhino but said it was one of the bones in the feet. I score that as correct with partial credit.

 

    

 

Just half an hour before we were ready to leave at 4pm, I was working on digging down to complete the trench around the mountain of bones we would soon have to jacket. I completed the curved trench I was digging and was lowering it to the level of the adjacent grid square. After digging through some sterile layered sand I got down to a section that had some bone. We dig with flat-blade screwdrivers to loosen the sandy matrix and if we feel the resistance of a harder bone we switch to a dental pick for more careful exploration. I bagged up some broken-up bone fragments that looked like turtle shell pieces and, after running into more than simply an isolated bone in the sandy matrix, I moved to the side to attack the bony bit from another side--sneaking up on it to judge its extent.

 

It was at this point when my dental pick uncovered a honeyed orange colored bone. This is the color we all secretly hope for while digging Montbrook. Most of the bones are either a well-preserved tan (like the rhino bit above), or a purplish color in a layer that preserves well but has lots of phosphatic matrix stuck to the bones making them difficult to clean-up or chalky white in a layer where the bones are not well mineralized. These bones (which we have named "pudding bones") are white and soft as a piece of wet drywall board. Orange, in contrast, is the color that many of the enameled mammal teeth preserve--it is the color we long to see emerge from the sand.

 

Brushing away the sand from this speck of orange confirmed that what I was seeing was indeed a mammal tooth. Jonathan always jokes at the beginning of the day that he is here to find "something with teeth" as this indicates cranial material that is inherently more interesting than most post-cranial finds. Richard commented that it wasn't the curator that stumbled upon something with teeth but Jonathan was happy just to see a new find with teeth emerge from the sandy matrix.

 

A bit more digging revealed three cusps of a proboscidean tooth but interestingly they were not from a gomphothere which are the most common hose-nose to be found at this site--it was instead mastodon! I believe only one other set of mastodon teeth have been found at the Montbrook site--also a smaller juvenile like this find. After a bit more uncovering we could see two complete 3-lophed teeth. The larger tooth was to the left indicating that this was toward the back of the maxilla (we could tell they were upper teeth not the lowers in the mandible based on the bone they were embedded in). This appeared to be a fragmented maxilla and no signs of tusks to the right have turned up (yet) but that could change with additional excavation.

 

    

 

    

 

You have to put in a lot of time digging out fragments of turtle shell or other common finds before you make a notable discovery. Finding both rhino and mastodon make this a red letter day in our book.

 

I won't be back to the site till next Wednesday but it will be interesting to see how much more has been revealed on Tuesday. Till then the grid squares with all those enviable finds will rest underneath a tarp awaiting our return.

 

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[Fossilis Willis]

We're fortunate to have you to share your fossil hunting accounts with us. You make it easy to live vicariously through you. I'm looking forward to Wednesday.

[digit]

I am (and have always been) a bit of a natural teller of tales and spinner of yarns (it's a family trait). I enjoy recounting fun and interesting outings and though they may represent the highlights and not the average day in the field it does demonstrate the lure that drives us to put in the time necessary to be there for these exceptional finds.

 

Many other members have deep knowledge of a variety of fossil types and can be counted upon for their input for identifying fossils in their bailiwick. I have a spattering of knowledge that grows in sync with the types of fossils I'm finding or working with and could never hope to hold a candle to the knowledge that some members bring. The role I try to fill (sometimes with some success) is to recount fossil hunting trips--independent forays into the field or scheduled volunteer digs like Montbrook--and try to give other members some idea of the experience. I've trained myself to stop and take photos along the way. Mainly, this helps me to remember individual days out fossil hunting but it also provides a visual component to bring my verbose stories alive. Hopefully, seeing the eye candy is a reward for making it through my little novellas of a story. If I can inspire any members to go to the places I've been or to volunteer for the digs with the FLMNH (in post-pandemic times) then all the better.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[Shellseeker]

Ken,

Enjoyed the story.  Fantastic finds and you are getting to be a professional grade photographer, as well. How about a future book regaling the world about the finds at Montbrook? 

[digit]

Thanks. I think I'll devote my time to digging and turning up more finds instead.

 

At some point in time the FLMNH is planning a large monograph detailing all of the different types of fauna that have appeared at the Montbrook site. I'll probably work with Roger Portell on a few scientific papers involving some of the more interesting invertebrate bits we've been able to identify and that work will roll into the larger publication encompassing all that's been discovered at the very rich site that is Montbrook.

 

The rest of the spring 2021 session will still be limited to a few local volunteers but hoping that post-pandemic this opens up to a wider group in the fall 2021 session. I'll make an announcement here if that happens.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[digit]

Well, the juvenile mastodon maxilla with the premolar and molar (P4 & M1) in place got a little more attention today. The crew that was out at the site on Tuesday did a bit of exploration around this piece of the skull to see if they could find any obvious areas where it was extending into but the specimen seemed relatively self contained. Here is the work area near the start of the day. Tammy was lowering the level in her adjacent grid square and the maxilla fragment with the teeth is protected under some plastic bone bags next to Tammy's blue gloves at the bottom of the photo.

 

 

The specimen was located toward the corner along the border of the squares where Tammy and I were working (14S x 9-10W in the site's coordinate system).

I spent the morning dropping the level of my grid square about 20 cm (~8") to make sure there were no other pieces of this mastodon skull hiding elsewhere nearby at the same level. I then snuck up on it till I had it surrounded--leaving it onto a nice pedestal ready for jacketing. We were interested if the other side of the maxilla (possibly with more teeth) might be located below it. We undercut this side of the pedestal and groped around in the soft sugar-sand matrix to see if we could uncover the tips of any addition teeth below the exposed pair. None turned up for all our probing and so we could make a nice manageable size jacket to take out this specimen. The last photo is from Tammy's side where she was working. You can see these upper teeth pretty well and can see that the P4 premolar on the left is a bit smaller than the M1 molar to the right which allowed us to orient this chunk of the maxilla so we would know what we might have expected to either side (though it turned out to be nothing but sterile sand).

 

     

 

We saved off some of the clean sugar sand from excavating around the specimen making the pedestal. We dampened this a bit and then packed on a protective layer to keep the plaster jacket from sticking to any of the previously exposed bone and enamel. With the specimen looking like a coral head or oversized mushroom cap we undercut the base a bit to prepare for jacketing. For smaller jackets like this we use gauze bandages that are coated with plaster powder. A quick dunk in a water bucket is all that is needed to start the chemical process of the plaster hardening. Richard Hulbert wrapped our little mound till it looked like a 25 pound Butterball turkey for Thanksgiving.

 

     

 

It was a warm, dry and sunny day with a nice breeze and so the jacket was set in no time at all. A small flat trenching shovel is pounded underneath the jacket to break it free from the matrix below and the jacket was quickly flipped over so as not to spill out any of its contents. Excess soft sandy matrix was stripped from the open side of the jacket to reduce its weight a little and generally keep stuff from falling out of the jacket later on. This jacket (#544) will now go into storage till the time some volunteer (in post-pandemic times) has the opportunity to dig down through the jacket till the bone is reached from below. B-72 consolidant will be dripped onto the bone as it is exposed to solidify the specimen bit by bit. With any luck there may be a future update to this saga when this specimen once again attracts some attention and effort to further reveal what we have found--maybe that volunteer prepping the jacket will be me.

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

 

 

[Nimravis]

Ken, great find and a great read. Thanks for taking the time to bring us along on this dig.

[digit]

UPDATE: The mastodon (cf. Mammut sellardsi) maxilla with the deciduous P4 and M1 got fast tracked through preparation and I was able to see it today at the warehouse when it arrived. Looks pretty cool!

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

 

 

[snolly50]

What a wonderful object. I enjoyed seeing it.

[digit]

And even better news is that I'm working through the university's paperwork to get my university ID and clearance so I'll be able to start learning how to prep jackets. This is another facet of volunteering at the museum that I've been looking forward to since we moved up here last summer. Now that we're fully vaccinated and the prep lab is soon to re-open I'll be able to add some additional fossil skills to my resume (C.V. for the rest of the world).

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[Clint08]

Beautiful looking fossil. Love that color.

[digit]

Mammal teeth seem to have the chemistry to become stained a nice golden orange. When you are digging through the sandy matrix with your trusty (and well worn) flat-blade screwdriver you sometimes uncover something orange which gets your attention. It is virtually always a clump or orange clay but every once and a while.....

 

Loading up the truck and ready to drive back to Montbrook this morning. Last couple days of the season and hoping to see some nice things come out before we cover it with tarps and sandbags.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[sharkdoctor]

Thanks for the great story and picts. I read this during a lunch break and it totally made my day. I felt like I was right there, on-site, for the several days covered in your story!

[fifbrindacier]

How lucky you are, thank you very much to share your experience with us.

[Jackson g]

Not sure how I missed this one! Very commendable service you are doing there. If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be "Danggggggggggggggggg"

[digit]

8 hours ago, sharkdoctor said:

Thanks for the great story and picts. I read this during a lunch break and it totally made my day. I felt like I was right there, on-site, for the several days covered in your story!

If I can make you feel you have sand in your shoes and under your fingernails after reading this then my work is done here.

 

6 hours ago, fifbrindacier said:

How lucky you are, thank you very much to share your experience with us.

Don't I know it! I don't have any great deep knowledge in any one area of fossils and so I hope that sharing my experiences here with forum members is enough to justify my membership here. My "luck" is a conscious engineered goal which I've worked hard to bring to fruition. I've always been happy to work around the fringes of real science and glad when I can contribute. I hope that my experiences as an outsider working with real scientists to further our knowledge brings some sort of entertainment to the membership and possibly motivates some to take up similar goals.

 

32 minutes ago, Jackson g said:

Not sure how I missed this one! Very commendable service you are doing there. If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be "Danggggggggggggggggg"

There is a lot posted on this forum daily and it is near impossible to keep up with it all (if you feel that sleep and food are truly essential).

 

Commendable? Heck no!  I'm selfishly having the time of my life playing paleontologist and soaking up all the stray knowledge I can like a shop vac.

 

It's been an odd year and Montbrook has been closed to the general volunteer public with limited digging sessions with just a few local experience volunteers since this time last year. We're really hoping that in the fall session (probably late October or early November) that we'll be able to open it to all who are interested again. We've had well over 800 volunteers at the site over the last 5 years and hope to see some old regulars and new faces in about 6 months.

 

The Montbrook site is a rare look into the late Miocene (~5.5-5.0 Ma) and the next closest site that approximates this period and faunal list is the Gray site in western Tennessee. It is quite literally one of the most important sites in all of the southeastern US. The fact that it is a short drive and being actively dug by the FLMNH making heavy use of volunteers is pretty much winning the fossil lottery. It really is hard to stop smiling the entire time I'm digging.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[fifbrindacier]

On 5/6/2021 at 3:25 AM, digit said:

If I can make you feel you have sand in your shoes and under your fingernails after reading this then my work is done here.

 

Don't I know it! I don't have any great deep knowledge in any one area of fossils and so I hope that sharing my experiences here with forum members is enough to justify my membership here. My "luck" is a conscious engineered goal which I've worked hard to bring to fruition. I've always been happy to work around the fringes of real science and glad when I can contribute. I hope that my experiences as an outsider working with real scientists to further our knowledge brings some sort of entertainment to the membership and possibly motivates some to take up similar goals.

 

There is a lot posted on this forum daily and it is near impossible to keep up with it all (if you feel that sleep and food are truly essential).

 

Commendable? Heck no!  I'm selfishly having the time of my life playing paleontologist and soaking up all the stray knowledge I can like a shop vac.

 

It's been an odd year and Montbrook has been closed to the general volunteer public with limited digging sessions with just a few local experience volunteers since this time last year. We're really hoping that in the fall session (probably late October or early November) that we'll be able to open it to all who are interested again. We've had well over 800 volunteers at the site over the last 5 years and hope to see some old regulars and new faces in about 6 months.

 

The Montbrook site is a rare look into the late Miocene (~5.5-5.0 Ma) and the next closest site that approximates this period and faunal list is the Gray site in western Tennessee. It is quite literally one of the most important sites in all of the southeastern US. The fact that it is a short drive and being actively dug by the FLMNH making heavy use of volunteers is pretty much winning the fossil lottery. It really is hard to stop smiling the entire time I'm digging.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

I apply since two years for a site at about five hours of car where you can find Dinosaur, where amateurs are admitted, but the places are rare and COVID is there. I hope next year i'll have the possibility to go digging there.

[digit]

2 hours ago, fifbrindacier said:

I apply since two years for a site at about five hours of car where you can find Dinosaur, where amateurs are admitted, but the places are rare and COVID is there. I hope next year i'll have the possibility to go digging there.

I'll keep my fingers crossed as well for you.

 

Opportunities to volunteer at interesting and scientifically important fossil sites are limited and it is worth the effort to try to gain admission. Hopefully, we'll be waking up from this global nightmare soon and we'll be able to resume "normal" activities. Our concept of "normal" may be to sit out in the sun and dig in the ground to find dinosaur bones. Is the site you mentioned limited to digging during a particular season or will it be potentially active throughout most of the year? You'll have to promise to take lots of photos and make us all jealous with your trip reports when you do manage to secure a spot on the volunteer digging team.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[Shellseeker]

On 5/4/2021 at 9:21 PM, digit said:

UPDATE: The mastodon (cf. Mammut sellardsi) maxilla with the deciduous P4 and M1 got fast tracked through preparation and I was able to see it today at the warehouse when it arrived. Looks pretty cool!

Great thread , Ken  Love the photos and retelling the adventure.  You are perfect for this. 

 

As an aside,  I have a number of Mammut teeth,  and I have always labeled them Mammut Americanus.  Have you picked up the piece of knowledge on how to differentiate the two?

[fifbrindacier]

9 hours ago, digit said:

I'll keep my fingers crossed as well for you.

 

Opportunities to volunteer at interesting and scientifically important fossil sites are limited and it is worth the effort to try to gain admission. Hopefully, we'll be waking up from this global nightmare soon and we'll be able to resume "normal" activities. Our concept of "normal" may be to sit out in the sun and dig in the ground to find dinosaur bones. Is the site you mentioned limited to digging during a particular season or will it be potentially active throughout most of the year? You'll have to promise to take lots of photos and make us all jealous with your trip reports when you do manage to secure a spot on the volunteer digging team.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

It's mostly active during summer. For this year it is compromised. And of course i'll make every one jealous with my trip report !

[ClearLake]

Excellent Ken!  That piece turned out to be a real beauty, nice find!  I’m going to be interested to hear when they open Montbrook back up to more volunteers. Thanks for the updated report. 

[digit]

Hopefully, the fall session at Montbrook will be open again to at full capacity. The last fall and spring sessions were limited to a small number of experienced local volunteers due to the pandemic. I expect we'll be opening up the site again to a larger volunteer effort sometime in early to mid November after the heat and rains of the summer have passed. Here's a site where you can sign-up and be notified by email when things are rolling again:

 

https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/montbrook/

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken