Are these fossils?

[MelissaL]

My backyard has a large area where it's mainly rocky, meaning you can't really dig. Separating it from the "nice" grassy side of the yard is a hill. My daughter and I have found fossils there of bivalves and snails. I've attached some pictures of what I found today.

 

But my question is regard to these tiny, circular, flat pieces that seem to cover the hill (first 3 pictures). I'm thinking they're a fossil of some kind, but I'm not sure. Can anyone help?

[Plax]

yep! Small flattish echinoids of some sort?

Edited April 6, 2022 by Plax

[Rockwood]

G. I don't think so. Had this ready to go.

The little flat disks are concretions. typically, a small percentage will have fossils in them though. 

[Al Dente]

I would guess some type of foram. Orbitulina maybe?

[MelissaL]

Al Dente, typing in Foram also showed pictures of Nummulite fossils. I'm not sure which mine would be though or if they're just concretions as Rockwood suggested. Either way, I think they've been narrowed down a bit. So thanks for that.

[digit]

35 minutes ago, Rockwood said:

The little flat disks are concretions. typically, a small percentage will have fossils in them though. 

If these were found in Florida then I'd guess many are forams and some could be flattened echinoids (i.e. "sand dollars"). Echinoids will have pentagonally symmetrical markings on them and forams generally have spiraled markings. You may need to look under magnification to see any of this. A bit of cleaning by soaking some in vinegar for a minute and then soaking with fresh water may remove some of the encrustation. You have a number to experiment with and if they are forams or echinoids, they should be calcitic and hold up to a weak acid treatment fairly well.

 

Give them a bit of a cleaning and see if you can get some close-up images. Probably tough with a smart phone (the camera of choice these days). Many have used small slip-on diopters made for these phones to help with micro-photos. You should be able to find an inexpensive one online. That will certainly help us to see these better.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[MelissaL]

Thanks, Ken. I'll clean some and see what I can see. Thanks for the feedback.

[Paleorunner]

I think they are orbitulins.
I pass this photo of my orbitulins for you to compare them.

 

Mine are the same size too.

 

Edited April 6, 2022 by Paleorunner

[digit]

Orbitolins as in forams of the genus Orbitolina? I love it when I learn something new.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbitolina

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[MelissaL]

Yes, they do look like your orbitulins. Very cool!

[Mark Kmiecik]

Orbitolina concava?

[JohnJ]

@MelissaL

They are Orbitolina texana, forams.  Chances are your house is located in the upper Glen Rose Formation.

[Mark Kmiecik]

2 hours ago, JohnJ said:

@MelissaL

They are Orbitolina texana, forams.  Chances are your house is located in the upper Glen Rose Formation.

 

I missed it by this (      ) much. 

[Jared C]

Here's a fun trip report featuring the Glen Rose formation - in the photos included, you can see that around the sea urchin (echinoid) fossils found, there sit many forams like yours. Hopefully this is inspiration to keep a keen eye out around your local rock outcrops - hiding among those forams you may just find fossils like those below 

 

[hemipristis]

12 hours ago, MelissaL said:

My backyard has a large area where it's mainly rocky, meaning you can't really dig. Separating it from the "nice" grassy side of the yard is a hill. My daughter and I have found fossils there of bivalves and snails. I've attached some pictures of what I found today.

 

But my question is regard to these tiny, circular, flat pieces that seem to cover the hill (first 3 pictures). I'm thinking they're a fossil of some kind, but I'm not sure. Can anyone help?

 

 

 

 

Had to edit my post.That'll teach me not to read all posts in a thread!  agreed. forams

Edited April 7, 2022 by hemipristis