Echies of Texas (Some Better Finds)

[JamieLynn]

Texas has had SO MUCH RAIN in the last month! Mushrooms are growing where there are normally NOT mushrooms growing- but that means it has been a bonanza for fossil hunting, needless to say! If you don't mind the mud.....  We have had some epic storms, too. 2+ inch hail, crazy lightning, a few tornado scares and amazing clouds. 

 

 

Hail from my house...my poor car. (That's a quarter for scale - 25mm)

 

But EVERYTHING is green and the wildflowers are gorgeous this year! 

 

Havn't found anything NEW, but did a couple of nicer examples, which always makes me happy. 

I have found lots of Coenholectypus planatus but something is always just a little bit wrong with them - a chip in the test or a little crushed plate or too much matrix to clean easily. So I was rather excited to find this little critter. Its color is lovely and it's in great shape albeit a little water worn. Glen Rose Formation: 

 

And I was VERY happy to find a better representation of a Goniophorus scotti from the Waco Research Pit (Del Rio Formation). My first and only other one was nice and big, but was rather squished. This one is TINY and in great shape: 5 mm

 

 

Hit up a new spot (Glen Rose Formation also) and found a fantastic array of Leptosalenia texanas. It was a rainy day and it was fun finding them like easter eggs amongst the rocks. Plus a nice big Heteraster texanus.

 

Also .75 in

 

A few more little ones from the Glen Rose Formation. Not as good as previous finds, but still nice nonetheless. The Balanocidarid spines are always a treat to find, being rather rare: 

 

And a Polydiadema travisenses:  (.75 in)

 

Found another new spot in the Walnut Formation (also SUPER muddy) that after an hour of finding huge chunks of Oxytropidoceras ammonites (I made my own.....an ammonite kit, as @erose would say) I was finally awarded a nice Tetragramma texanum:

 

My "Ammonite"  At least THREE of the pieces really do go together..... 

12 inches

And I found enough other pieces to "make" a second one for my mom. hahahaha!

[JohnJ]

Great specimens, Jamie! Good to see you got out.  Sorry y'all didn't dodge the hail.

 

[JamieLynn]

So long as we dodged the tornados! hahahah!! 

[JohnJ]

11 minutes ago, JamieLynn said:

So long as we dodged the tornados! hahahah!! 

Indeed! 

[Ludwigia]

Lovely finds! And the nature shots are great! Such lushness! Cute ammos too

[FossilDAWG]

Beautiful echies!  Me like!

 

Don

[fossilhunter21]

Those are some fine looking fossils Jamie!

 

Thanks for sharing!   

[JamieLynn]

Thanks y'all! 

[erose]

Great report. You took the brunt of some of those storms in SM. By the time it reached us up the pike it was always a bit less. Our hail was mostly little.  

 

I finally got out this last weekend. My local Walnut Formation exposures have been served well by all that rain. Got me a little ammonite in kit-form as well.

[FossilNerd]

Nice finds Jamie! Love those echinoids, and I am fond of puzzles so the Ammonite kits are nice as well.  

[caterpillar]

Nice echinids. Congratulations

[Coco]

Hi,

 

Nice sea urchins !

 

Coco

[JamieLynn]

Thank you everyone! 

[HotSauceCommittee]

Beautiful echs, @JamieLynn! One of my goals this year was to try to head down to Central TX and do some echinoid hunting but first the rain and now with the heat . . . I think I'm just going to have to live vicariously through your finds until winter now. lol.

[RuMert]

Hail the size of echinoids, not bad

[JamieLynn]

14 hours ago, HotSauceCommittee said:

Beautiful echs, @JamieLynn! One of my goals this year was to try to head down to Central TX and do some echinoid hunting but first the rain and now with the heat . . . I think I'm just going to have to live vicariously through your finds until winter now. lol.

If you get out early enough in the morning....it's not TOO bad. hhhahahha