Peace River Ear bone

[Meganeura]

Found this earbone this past week - have another just like it, but never got an ID. So hopefully this time around I can! It’s 1.2”/30mm long.

 

@Shellseeker

@diginupbones

@Harry Pristis

[Shellseeker]

Daniel, Yours is worn and beat up a little...

 

Why do you think it is different from those small horse earbones just posted by @diginupbones   or looking at this posting of mine ?

 

Richard was the only one who could address ear bone identification requests.  I think yours could be a worn beat up small horse... what do you think?

 

[Meganeura]

2 minutes ago, Shellseeker said:

Daniel, Yours is worn and beat up a little...

 

Why do you think it is different from those small horse earbones just posted by @diginupbones   or looking at this posting of mine ?

 

Richard was the only one who could address ear bone identification requests.  I think yours could be a worn beat up small horse... what do you think?

 

Ya know I feel like the first time I looked at your pics of it I thought "Oh, that's totally different." But its... well, nearly identical, minus the skull. Tridactly, right? Based on the size?

[diginupbones]

Wish I could help but I’m as confused as ever on these things.  very little info out there on mammal petrosals!

[Harry Pristis]

In April, 2019, minnbuckeye reported the bones in the image below are bison, horse, and horse, (left to right), according to Hulbert.

 

[PODIGGER]

I vote for horse.

[Meganeura]

So consensus is tridactyl horse? Interesting, this one I found in an area that was entirely Pleistocene (save a couple Meg frags). Maybe it’s a juvenile Equus, or just something that floated down from an older deposit. Neat!

[Shellseeker]

15 hours ago, Meganeura said:

So consensus is tridactyl horse? Interesting, this one I found in an area that was entirely Pleistocene (save a couple Meg frags). Maybe it’s a juvenile Equus, or just something that floated down from an older deposit. Neat!

You might be right...

You note in that other thread from @PODIGGER,  How do you compare your tooth to the ones that Richard IDed for @diginupbones ?

 

Here is one (on the right)  I found in July, 2021 in the Peace River,

 

For me, giving the options,  I think that they are all Tridactyls.

[Meganeura]

9 hours ago, Shellseeker said:

You might be right...

You note in that other thread from @PODIGGER,  How do you compare your tooth to the ones that Richard IDed for @diginupbones ?

 

Here is one (on the right)  I found in July, 2021 in the Peace River,

 

For me, giving the options,  I think that they are all Tridactyls.

That’s the strange thing. We all know 3-toed material is… rare, at least rarer than Equus. So… where’s the Equus petrosals? We’ve seen 2 posted on the forum from Minbuckeyes thread. 

[Shellseeker]

3 hours ago, Meganeura said:

That’s the strange thing. We all know 3-toed material is… rare, at least rarer than Equus. So… where’s the Equus petrosals? We’ve seen 2 posted on the forum from Minbuckeyes thread. 

There are lots of considerations when you start thinking about the population density of any specific fossil at one of our hunting locations..

I will use dolphin fossils as an example..

When was the last age where we had dolphins in the area of the "Peace River" "

I have found (in order of quantity) 1) Jaw fragments without teeth, 2) Periotics, 3) teeth,  4) Bulla, 5) Verts...  Most Dolphin have exactly 2 x 2 earbones and LOTS of teeth and verts.. Why do I find more broken and complete ear bones than anything else.

The same is not true of Horse, I find far more teeth than earbones of all Genus types.

 

We do not have a valid sample to make the judgement .. Many of my hunting companions are focused like crazy people on MEGS, TEETH, TUSKS and do not want anything else like bones..They throw them back or give them to me if they know I want them.

Low %'s of the people I know who fossil hunt intentionally do not post on forums like this. The view generally is "Why increase the competition for limited resources?"

 

I can count the number of 3-toed fossils I have found in the Peace River (mostly teeth) using both hands.  That is pretty rare for 15 years of hunting. Those fossils lasted 3-4 myas,  the last Equus fossil might have been dropped 15000 years ago...

Finally Equus petrosals may be easier to damage then 3 toed.

For my part, I have about 50 Equus Petrosals in various conditions versus 1 3_toed petrosal found in the Peace River... But I am interested in ear bones ,  I do not throw them away as funny looking rocks..

 

 

 

[Meganeura]

5 hours ago, Shellseeker said:

There are lots of considerations when you start thinking about the population density of any specific fossil at one of our hunting locations..

I will use dolphin fossils as an example..

When was the last age where we had dolphins in the area of the "Peace River" "

I have found (in order of quantity) 1) Jaw fragments without teeth, 2) Periotics, 3) teeth,  4) Bulla, 5) Verts...  Most Dolphin have exactly 2 x 2 earbones and LOTS of teeth and verts.. Why do I find more broken and complete ear bones than anything else.

The same is not true of Horse, I find far more teeth than earbones of all Genus types.

 

We do not have a valid sample to make the judgement .. Many of my hunting companions are focused like crazy people on MEGS, TEETH, TUSKS and do not want anything else like bones..They throw them back or give them to me if they know I want them.

Low %'s of the people I know who fossil hunt intentionally do not post on forums like this. The view generally is "Why increase the competition for limited resources?"

 

I can count the number of 3-toed fossils I have found in the Peace River (mostly teeth) using both hands.  That is pretty rare for 15 years of hunting. Those fossils lasted 3-4 myas,  the last Equus fossil might have been dropped 15000 years ago...

Finally Equus petrosals may be easier to damage then 3 toed.

For my part, I have about 50 Equus Petrosals in various conditions versus 1 3_toed petrosal found in the Peace River... But I am interested in ear bones ,  I do not throw them away as funny looking rocks..

 

 

 

50 Equus? I’ve got 0 Equus, and as of today, 3 3-toed. Petrosals that is. 

[Shellseeker]

15 hours ago, Meganeura said:

50 Equus? I’ve got 0 Equus, and as of today, 3 3-toed. Petrosals that is. 

I have been hunting the Peace river since 2008.  Much like Diginupbones with his Tridactly ear bones, I had a box of approx 50 ear bones.  I lost some to Hurricane Ian.

[Meganeura]

25 minutes ago, Shellseeker said:

I have been hunting the Peace river since 2008.  Much like Diginupbones with his Tridactly ear bones, I had a box of approx 50 ear bones.  I lost some to Hurricane Ian.

Do you remember the size on the Equus ones? Or have any left anyway?

[Shellseeker]

1 hour ago, Meganeura said:

Do you remember the size on the Equus ones? Or have any left anyway?

"remember"  ???Daniel,  I can not remember to take my keys when I'm going to drive my pickup.

I have photos and old TFF threads.... and still have 20 or so.

This was one of the largest....

 

Another:

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/78547-medial-phalanx/&tab=comments#comment-829140

 

[Meganeura]

35 minutes ago, Shellseeker said:

"remember"  ???Daniel,  I can not remember to take my keys when I'm going to drive my pickup.

I have photos and old TFF threads.... and still have 20 or so.

This was one of the largest....

 

Another:

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/78547-medial-phalanx/&tab=comments#comment-829140

 

They look quite different from tridactyl ones. Interesting. 

[Shellseeker]

Possibly, @diginupbones can provide the lengths of his examples...

 

I went down to the carport, looking in the cabinets and boxes and trays with fossils I picked up on my and neighbors property after Ian.

There were 7 or 8 in this cabinet tray..

 

I grabbed a few and rinsed them off..

 

 

 

I think this last set is enough like South Dakota small horses to  recognize that as from the same Family,  especially if Richard has done so...

 

[diginupbones]

1 hour ago, Shellseeker said:

Possibly, @diginupbones can provide the lengths of his examples...

I was planning on taking a closer look at my collection and posting some measurements sometime soon. 

[diginupbones]

I finally had time to take a more detailed look at my ear bone collection. They seem to fall into a few different groups but I have no idea if this is due to species, the age of the animal when it died or erosion. I took my measurements as if you were looking at the chewing surface of a tooth with length being right to left and width  being top to bottom. I didn’t see any purpose in measuring height  because that was pretty dependent on how much braincase was left on the petrosal. This is probably more info than you wanted but might be useful for future reference. I also wonder if @fossillarry would have any input on these. The first group are the largest ones and seem to be a little more robust. They also have a longer flatter angle on one side. The average size of these is L = 35 mm and W = 31 mm

The second group are a bit smaller and have  almost a kind of pear-shape. Again this could be due to the age of the animal or erosion. This group measures an average of L =28 mm and W = 27 mm. 

The next ones are smaller yet and it doesn’t seem like the shape is due to erosion because one of them has quite a bit of brain case left on it and I think that material would have fallen off or worn away have these been larger. These measure approximately 25 mm x 25 mm

 

here are a couple of oddball ones that have quite a bit of brain cases left on them they seem to have a little different shape than the rest.

 

lastly I have a couple of tiny ones. The smallest one measures 16 mm x 20 mm

 

[Meganeura]

4 hours ago, diginupbones said:

I finally had time to take a more detailed look at my ear bone collection. They seem to fall into a few different groups but I have no idea if this is due to species, the age of the animal when it died or erosion. I took my measurements as if you were looking at the chewing surface of a tooth with length being right to left and width  being top to bottom. I didn’t see any purpose in measuring height  because that was pretty dependent on how much braincase was left on the petrosal. This is probably more info than you wanted but might be useful for future reference. I also wonder if @fossillarry would have any input on these. The first group are the largest ones and seem to be a little more robust. They also have a longer flatter angle on one side. The average size of these is L = 35 mm and W = 31 mm

The second group are a bit smaller and have  almost a kind of pear-shape. Again this could be due to the age of the animal or erosion. This group measures an average of L =28 mm and W = 27 mm. 

The next ones are smaller yet and it doesn’t seem like the shape is due to erosion because one of them has quite a bit of brain case left on it and I think that material would have fallen off or worn away have these been larger. These measure approximately 25 mm x 25 mm

 

here are a couple of oddball ones that have quite a bit of brain cases left on them they seem to have a little different shape than the rest.

 

lastly I have a couple of tiny ones. The smallest one measures 16 mm x 20 mm

 

Where did these all come from by the way? It’s crazy how much more worn they seem compared to some of the others I’ve seen - 2 of my 3 are very unworn for example.

[Shellseeker]

10 hours ago, diginupbones said:

I finally had time to take a more detailed look at my ear bone collection. They seem to fall into a few different groups but I have no idea if this is due to species, the age of the animal when it died or erosion. I took my measurements as if you were looking at the chewing surface of a tooth with length being right to left and width  being top to bottom. I didn’t see any purpose in measuring height  because that was pretty dependent on how much braincase was left on the petrosal. This is probably more info than you wanted but might be useful for future reference. I also wonder if @fossillarry would have any input on these. The first group are the largest ones and seem to be a little more robust. They also have a longer flatter angle on one side. The average size of these is L = 35 mm and W = 31 mm

First,  Thanks for your efforts in doing the sorting and measurements.  In order to progress , we need to get some data points based on actual fossils.

Note that in my 3 example post,  2 Equus are respectively 37 and 38 mm,  and so might easily fit into your large category.  We would expect Equus earbones in South Dakota and likely Bison also... My largest earbone at 44.5 might be Bison and Hulbert identified one of Mike's as large enough to be Bison...

 

There has been tremendous wear /tear and erosion (wind, water, etc) against your earbones, much more than we would ever expect in Florida environments, but obviously Richard Hulbert was able to detect HORSE ear bones in your submissions.

 

It is not hard for  me to look at my finds, break off the skull elements,  subject them to SD wear and tear,  and see great similarities. These 2 below might fit into your smallest category..

 

We know,  I think what Horses, Bison,  Mammoth, Mastodon, Camel, Manatee, Sloth, whale, dolphin and maybe a few more mammal ear bones look like....

But I do not know what Dire Wolf,  Jaguar, Tapir, Peccary, Rhino, Bear, Armadillo, Glyptodont, earbones and many other mammals ear bones look like and fossils of this fauna occur frequently across Bone Valley..

We have lots to learn and that is always a good thing...