Proboscidean Tusk?

[Brandy Cole]

When I first decided to picked this piece up I thought it was just an interesting looking chunk of petrified wood, but when I grabbed it, it felt and looked weirdly light and fragile.

 

I pulled it out of the bag for cleanup today and noticed what looked like faint schreger lines.

 

Pictures in the daylight made the lines look clearer, though it's hard for me to make out exactly how they run. 

 

[Meganeura]

10000000% yep - proboscidean. You can see the Schreger lines - can't be anything but!

[Rockwood]

1 hour ago, Meganeura said:

You can see the Schreger lines

Where ? It looks a lot like wood to me.

[Meganeura]

6 minutes ago, Rockwood said:

Where ? It looks a lot like wood to me.

Circled in red - it's not a ton of area, but it's enough to convince me. That being said - I don't know texas pet wood all that well, so what I'm seeing could be something else.

[Brandy Cole]

@Meganeura. That's what I saw too.  Always good to have another set of eyes on it, especially since it's too fragile for me to clean it very well.

 

[Meganeura]

1 minute ago, Brandy Cole said:

@Meganeura. That's what I saw too.  Always good to have another set of eyes on it, especially since it's too fragile for me to clean it very well.

 

So once again - I don't know Petrified Wood well, especially from Texas - but the pet wood I do have is SOLID. If it's that fragile, I think that's even MORE likely to be tusk, I know how fragile it gets.

[diginupbones]

9 minutes ago, Rockwood said:

Where ? It looks a lot like wood to me.

Agree. I see no Schreger lines. I have some pieces that look just like this and I was convinced that they were ivory until I polished  the end and they turned out to be pet wood.  

[Brandy Cole]

@Meganeura. I see a lot of petrified wood where I am, and the key things that distinguish it are the weight, the flakiness, and the way it reacted to water.

 

I tried to clean it up some, and petrified wood reacts pretty much the way rocks do when you wet them.  This piece acted differently.  It seemed to soak the water up immediately, like a sponge, but then felt dry to the touch without me drying it.  That was the same weird reaction that my bigger mammoth tooth chunk had and was another thing that made me think it was different.  

 

Then seeing the lines when I took it in the sunlight pushed me over.

[Rockwood]

I was just contemplating if this would polish up to look like schreger lines. I too still question it.

[Meganeura]

1 minute ago, Brandy Cole said:

@Meganeura. I see a lot of petrified wood where I am, and the key things that distinguish it are the weight, the flakiness, and the way it reacted to water.

 

I tried to clean it up some, and petrified wood reacts pretty much the way rocks do when you wet them.  This piece acted differently.  It seemed to soak the water up immediately, like a sponge, but then felt dry to the touch without me drying it.  That was the same weird reaction that my bigger mammoth tooth chunk had and was another thing that made me think it was different.  

 

Then seeing the lines when I took it in the sunlight pushed me over.

Yeah, I know here tusk will wet like water, but it's quite fragile - i'll often find a piece that's layered, and the second i put it in my box, it'll split into 2 pieces.

[Meganeura]

Just now, Rockwood said:

I was just contemplating if this would polish up to look like schreger lines. I too still question it.

Honestly I think that's totally fair - I'm no expert, obviously, and without being there in person I can't say for certain, but I see what i think are schreger lines, and @Brandy Cole's description of the fragility and texture and what not, alongside the shape, scream tusk to me.

[Brandy Cole]

I think @JohnJ probably has a lot of experience with tusks and pet wood.  Would like to get his take.

 

[Brandy Cole]

@Meganeura. From what I've seen in hand and the large amount of pet wood we find, I'm fairly confident it's not petrified wood.   Especially since you also noticed the same lines that I saw. But I'm always more cautious when it's something I'm pretty excited about, so it never hurts to get more eyes. 

I'll try to tag some other members with tusk experience.

 

@Shellseeker @GPayton@garyc @darrow

 

[Shellseeker]

To me , it seems clear,  but possibly because I find more tusk than wood.

[Brandy Cole]

@Shellseeker Wow, awesome pics!

[Shellseeker]

1 hour ago, Brandy Cole said:

@Shellseeker Wow, awesome pics!

I have been very fortunate. It was a lot of fun finding these.. much more fun that taking the photos...

[garyc]

I’m definitely seeing schreger lines

[JohnJ]

Congratulations, @Brandy Cole!

 

 

 

 

[JohnJ]

Brandy, is it the least bit 'tacky' when your hand is damp?

[Brandy Cole]

@JohnJ. When I rubbed a wet toothbrush across it and then touched it, the water looked like it soaked in almost immediately and the surface felt sticky, stickier than fossil bone. I was planning on consolidating as soon as possible because that's how my mammoth tooth felt, and it started crumbling when I got it really wet.  

So I was going to skip trying to clean it and go straight to consolation after that.

Edited September 26, 2022 by Brandy Cole
Spelling correction

[JohnJ]

1 minute ago, Brandy Cole said:

the surface felt sticky, stickier than fossil bone.

 

That is more confirmation it is tusk.  The pieces I've found have that 'sticky' characteristic when damp.  

[Rockwood]

 Looks like that is what weathered schreger lines look like. Congratulations @Brandy Cole. 

[diginupbones]

10 hours ago, Brandy Cole said:

When I rubbed a wet toothbrush across it and then touched it, the water looked like it soaked in almost immediately and the surface felt sticky, stickier than fossil bone. I was planning on consolidating as soon as possible because that's how my mammoth tooth felt, and it started crumbling when I got it really wet.  

Congrats Brandy! Preservation in my neck of the woods is very different with ivory. Here are a couple of pieces from my collection where you can obviously see Schreger  lines. Not sticky at all, won’t absorb water and sounds like glass when you tap on it. Not trying to hijack your thread but I thought this would be some interesting info to add to it. @JohnJ do you have any idea why they would be such a huge difference in preservation?

 

[Meganeura]

3 minutes ago, diginupbones said:

Congrats Brandy! Preservation in my neck of the woods is very different with ivory. Here are a couple of pieces from my collection where you can obviously see Schreger  lines. Not sticky at all, won’t absorb water and sounds like glass when you tap on it. Not trying to hijack your thread but I thought this would be some interesting info to add to it. @JohnJ do you have any idea why they would be such a huge difference in preservation?

 

Not @JohnJ but I think it's to do with the minerals that are involved in the fossilization process? Same reason why here in Florida you can get blue Megs that are more fragile than the black phosphate megs from the river. I found a horse tooth in clay last week that fell apart the second I touched it. I've also found horse teeth that are rock solid.

[JohnJ]

1 hour ago, diginupbones said:

@JohnJ do you have any idea why they would be such a huge difference in preservation?

 

I don't have any literature to back up the assumption it has to do with the level of permineralization, but that is my best guess.  Interestingly, I have found tusk pieces from the early Pleistocene and a Miocene aged Gomphothere tusk tip that are Not close to being as fragile as the tusk fragment I posted above.  Yet, they still exhibit the "stickiness" to damp skin.