A full weekend in central texas

[Jared C]

While I haven't made a trip report in a while, I certainly have been hunting a lot: As I get better at it, I've become more selective about what trips warrant getting posted, but this weekend was worth it even though none of the finds were truly spectacular (to most people, I have a different opinion )

 

Saturday was spent exploring the Ozan (and possibly Dessau) formations. Like usual, I did far more exploring than actual searching, but I did start off with a nice Scapanorynchus rear tooth, plucked from a gentle current.

 

 

From here, the cretaceous finds stagnated. After coming across a bison tooth (a constant in this creek), I was stopped dead in my tracks with a large projectile point sitting plainly on the surface.

 

The ID on this one ended up being a "Nolan", dating between 4,000-6,000 years old. Unlike most points, Nolans can be attributed to a culture- the Clear Fork culture.

 

Within 10 minutes, maybe 8 feet away in the same gravel bank, I then saw this: 

 

After removing it, I had to take a moment to recover:

 

I'm brand new in my journey in learning about artifacts, so all I knew in the moment was that this was intricate, large, and much different from anything I've found before.

Turns out it's a "Castroville", aged between 2,500-3,000 years old.

 

Here are three artifacts from that day. I should mention after that exciting 10 minutes I got practically skunked of both fossils and points for another 2.5 hours before heading home. Funny it always happens that way

 

Today found me in a different part of town - this time exploring a walk upstream of my usual Eagle Ford spot. While I couldn't find the source exposure (darn erosion control wall..), I did find several extremely fossiliferous slabs. It seems like someone came through and beat me to it, getting nerve-wrackingly close to my usual spot. They did miss quite a bit though, and in between the smashed slabs I found dozens of shark teeth - too many to collect, especially as most were very small / broken.

 

Some highlights:

 

A long tooth of some sort next to a Squalicorax tooth. I'm very much looking forward to prepping this and seeing what it is.

 

Also, here's a shark tooth root poking out- I'm optimistic, as I find very few teeth in central texas that aren't small - this would be a decent size for the area. I'll update this when I finish that prep

 

And lastly, a sight that I didn't think I'd encounter soon - a Ptychodus in solid limestone of all places:

[HemiHunter]

Awesome points!

[JohnJ]

Is that Nolan stem alternately beveled?

 

Congrats on some beautiful finds.  

[Sjfriend]

Nice finds! Someday I'd love to come down there for the artifact hunting! Love the arrowheads!

 

Hope the buried tooth preps well for you.

[Jared C]

1 hour ago, JohnJ said:

Is that Nolan stem alternately beveled?

 

To be honest, I don't know what beveling is or looks like - I'm brand new to projectile points. Is alternate beveling rare? I'll post photos of the stem

[Jared C]

1 hour ago, JohnJ said:

Is that Nolan stem alternately beveled?

 

Congrats on some beautiful finds.  

Oh wait! I think I may have figured it out - you're referring to the relative positions of the edges compared to one another? Because that's what I'm seeing - on one side of the stem, the edge is all the way down, while on the other side the edge is all the way up. Here are some photos

 

Is this what you're referring to? 

 

[JohnJ]

5 minutes ago, Jared C said:

Is this what you're referring to? 

Yes.  The alternate beveling is a diagnostic characteristic for the Nolan type.

[Jared C]

1 minute ago, JohnJ said:

Yes.  The alternate beveling is a diagnostic characteristic for the Nolan type.

Cool, learned something new! Do you know if it served a particular function over normal beveling?

[JohnJ]

8 minutes ago, Jared C said:

Cool, learned something new! Do you know if it served a particular function over normal beveling?

I do not.  If I had to guess, it probably was an advantage to a hafting style or materials.

[erose]

Really cool stuff! 

 

 

PSJohn helped me find my very first artifacts after decades of never finding them....

[Jackito]

Wow! Those artifacts are amazing!

[Ancient Bones]

Great finds Jared, and nice pics too.  ( I was thrilled to find my one and only bison tooth in October lol )