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Coral?


Hunson Abadeer

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I found this recently loose on a beach in southern NJ, USA. Pretty sure it's coral of some kind, but not sure if it qualifies as a fossil. It appears to have remnants of the creature(s) under the wheel-looking parts that can sort of be seen from the second pic. I have pics from other angles, but they went over the file limit. I could try to post them if necessary. Any help on identification or approximate age would be awesome. Thanx for your time!

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if you found it on a beach it could be modern, and judging by the state of it i would think so.

I'm CRAZY about amber fossils and just as CRAZY in general.

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Not a coral, it's a bonefish pharyngeal bone.

Don

Wow, so it's like a tooth? Freaky. Would never have guessed that... Thanx!

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It would be the part of the mouth that held the teeth in. A mouthplate... Each of those gaps contained a tooth. Look up drum fish mouthplate for comparison. :)

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It would be the part of the mouth that held the teeth in. A mouthplate... Each of those gaps contained a tooth. Look up drum fish mouthplate for comparison. :)

Aha, the drum fish plates are very similar. So, (excuse my lame terminology) the disc looking things that are under the wheel-like circle indentations are teeth that didn't pop out or develop yet?

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There are no teeth left in the plate. What you are seeing at the bottom of the indentations would be where the tooth would have met the bone. Bone is porous. It is a nice find although it doesn't look like any fossilized ones I've found. I am guessing more modern but I'm not an expert. Still cool! :)

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It seems very fragile. Probably modern like ya said. As you can see by the sand around it, I'm afraid to clean it. I just keep shaking the sand out... It apparently has an infinite capacity for holding sand!

The parts I was curious about were these things I circled:

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For lack of a better description. they look like small, hollow, inverted bowls that follow the shape of the "wheel" they are under. They are loose, but secure in their "compartments". There's at least two intact. Here's a cropped underside shot for some detail (sorry about the low res)...

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One more angle...

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