Texas Creek Hunting - Cretaceous Grayson Formation

[JamieLynn]

I am, admittedly, not much of a creek hunter. I prefer a road cut any day to slogging around in knee deep water and mud to find the fossils. But sometimes you gotta get out of your comfort zone! And it was WELL WORTH IT!!!  My friend was kind enough to share one of his local spots - we've had some good rains in Texas recently and he thought it might be producing some more heteromorph ammonites. He has collected some amazing big and well preserved Mariellas there and I have been DYING to find a good one. All that I have found in my local creeks have been so water worn as to be practically unrecognizable.  

 

So dodging some local rainstorms I pulled on my water boots and slogged my way upstream with him and his bounding doggo- I swear there is nothing much more joyful than a dog who loves water....in the water. 

 

 

It took me a while to start seeing the ammonites. It is always fascinating to me how you have to learn to "see" the fossil.

What I would pass by, he would point out....you missed one there!  I finally started to see them and found a couple of very nice ones. I was hoping to find a full three whorls together, but only found two whorls. There were fragment all over the place, but finding intact ones is much more difficult. 

 

I was super thrilled to come back with two very nice specimens and for one of them, I found a whorl fragment that matches it PRETTY well, so I just pretend I found a three whorl Mariella.

 

My "three" whorl:  7 inches

 

Another big one, not as well preserved, but with no "added" whorl. hahahha

7 inches

 

Another nice fragment. 4 inches

 

AND, I was lucky to have found a Hemiaster calvini echinoid too! He said it's only the second echinoid he's seen from this location. It's pretty water worn but has some interesting color and detail. 1 3/4 inch

 

Also this lovely oyster Lopha. It has both valves which is always a plus: 4 inches

 

We found a couple of crumbly nautiloids that didn't survive the extraction, so I was kind of disappointed, but then.....as we were leaving, I look down and see the edge of this guy sticking out of the bank.  I called out "hey, come look!" and my friend was amazed that he had JUST walked right past it!!! We dug it out and I got to carry a nice big nautilus the rest of the way up the creek!  And believe me, two big mariellas, an assortment of other fossils and a big nautiloid are quite a load when you have to scramble up a creek bank. Fortunately, I did have a little help. 

 

 

 

So a great day in the creek, even though I did get startled by a gar, I am a little more comfortable going creek hunting! Oh, and the sky was beautiful too.  A lovely day in Central Texas. 

 

 

 

 

 

[historianmichael]

Nice Mariella. Congratulations on finding a "three" whorl one!

[HotSauceCommittee]

Congrats @JamieLynn! I love those. I think the best I have ever done up here in North TX is 2.5 whorls. Maybe I'll steal your idea and glue a few together and make a Frankenmariella with 8 or 9 whorls. 

[JamieLynn]

@HotSauceCommittee ahahhah!! Frankenmariella!  That's GOOD!