Fossil Contributions to Paleontology - The Gallery

[bruce]

Three Myliobatiformes vertebrae

Astoria Formation - Miocene

Found on the north shore of the Columbia River at Knappton, WA

Given to Royal Tyrrell Museum, Drumheller, Alberta, 2013

Dr. Michael Newbrey was interested in studying them.

[deutscheben]

Arachnid (possibly Curculioides sp.?)

Energy Shale - Pennsylvanian

Vermilion County, IL

Donated to the Illinois State Museum, September 2015

This specimen was found on state land and arthropod fossils are rare from this deposit.

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/60016-pennsylvanian-arachnid-donated-to-illinois-state-museum/

[Mediospirifer]

Here's my contribution:

Pathological Glyptorthis insculpta

Ordovician, Cincinnatian series, either Waynesville or Liberty formation (surface collected from an area with both exposed and weathered loose)

Roadcut near Brookville, IN

Orton Geological Museum Ohio State University)

The brachiopod specialist who examined my specimens, David Wright, said he'd never seen this kind of pathology and was interested in further study.

Linked page: Pathological Brachiopods!

 

[Carl]

More vertebrate bits (shark teeth, chondricthyan cartilage, fish jaws, fish scales, coprolites) from Texas and Oklahoma added to the AMNH collections. Numbers pending. TFF members Carl (and my wife Fiona) and dinodigger in attendance.

Age: Early Permian

Localities: Seymour, TX & Waurika, OK

Donated to: American Museum of Natural History

Edited December 31, 2015 by Carl

[Terry Dactyll]

Crockhey Opencast had finished and I had a surplus of fossils after sorting through what I actually wanted to keep and decided it would be a good idea to donate some to a museum rather than have them all just sat in a box somewhere..... A friend felt the same and we had been doing the rounds of the museums with the best fossil displays all around the country and were very impressed with Lapworth Museum part of Birmingham University....we were so impressed by the old style hardwood victorian display cabinets (It was like walking back in time) that we decided to let them have a good representative sample of what fossils were found at crockhey for 2 reasons

1. The material would be viewed and hopefully used by students being a University Museum and they also had a recent acquisitions display cabinet where stuff was put out on display....

2. They already held an important upper carboniferous collection from Cosley in Staffordshire and we thought it would be good for them to have similar material and preservation to compare sites…..

The biggest piece of fern donated to Lapworth Museum Birmingham University….

Paripteris gigas.... Upper Carbonifereous..... Westphalian... Crockhey Opencast Wigan....

Along with this they had my best tree trunk cast and a large representative sample of siderite nodular plant and animal fossils to be used by students for research and education.... I received a very nice letter of thanks for the above at the time...

Anyone passing through Birmingham UK try and make sure you visit the museum.... Some fabulous fossils....

[GeschWhat]

Marine Coprolites

Eagle Ford Formation

Lewisville, Texas

University of Colorado, Boulder

I had received a donation of approximately 89 coprolites from a gentleman in Texas when he learned that I enjoyed studying them. Because they had all been found in close proximity, had diverse morphology and significant inclusions, I felt they would be better suited for study in an academic setting. So after analyzing, photographing and documenting each to the best of my ability, they were sent to the University of Colorado where they will be used in a comparative study of marine coprolites from another region. The photos below are of some of the more interesting specimens. Sorry, there is no scale on these photos, but the following ranged in size from 3 to 4 cm. Since they were donated mid-2015, no study has yet been published.

[monsterrack]

This was found in Jefferson Co. Ms. it is a ground sloth(Paramylodon Harlani) humerus. It is the most complete specimen of it's kind and one of the most complete Paramylodon bones ever found/reported in the twin states of Ms.& Al. Three such humeri were found in the Black Prairie of Alabama in the 1970 & 1980, but none were complete as this. I donated it to the Ms. Museum of Natural Science in Jackson Ms. so it can be studied by George Phillips and put on display.

[MarcoSr]

Peradectes gulottai (marsupial)

Early Eocene, Nanjemoy Formation

Stafford County, Virginia

Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC

The specimen was donated so it could be studied and described. It was a new marsupial species.

Marco Sr.

[bruce]

A new genus and species of a flightless penguin-like seabird or plotopterid, is described in the May issue of the Journal of Paleontology, was donated to the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt. I found three concretions in a slide above a remote area in the Lincoln Creek Formation in Washington State in 2012, and sent them to Dr. Gerald Mayr, fossil bird expert. The bones date from late Eocene or early Oligocene are the first documented bird fossils reported from the Lincoln Creek Formation. This find was also unique in that it contained the first and only complete right tibiotarsus ever found. When asked about the size of the bird, Dr Mayr replied, "Olympidytes thieli may have been about the size of a larger extant penguin, such as the Emperor Penguin” (average height four feet). Plotopteridae have only been found in North America and in Japan.

Contained in the concretions were both femora, both tibioitarsi, two caudal vertebrae, and a pygostyle (tailbone). Not shown are a partial patella, parts of two sternal ribs and two gastroliths.

The original concretions were re-assembled to show the position in where they were found in 2012.

Here is part of one of the hollow bones that was protruding out one end of the concretion that indicated it might be from a bird.

This is the same hollow-bone concretion, partially prepared being examined by Jim Goedert and compared to a cast of plotopterid bone Jim received from Japan. The matrix was hard to separate from the bone, without damaging the surface and fine features such as muscle connection points, so mechanical preparation was stopped it was sent to Germany for acid preparation.

The largest concretion when broken showed several bones inside.

References:

Gerald Mayr and James L. Goedert (2016). "New late Eocene and Oligocene remains of the flightless, penguin-like plotopterids (Aves, Plotopteridae) from western Washington State, U.S.A.". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. Online edition: e1163573.

[sixgill pete]

This tooth was donated to the Smithsonian on 28 May 2016. It is from the Oligocene of North Carolina and specifically from the Belgrade Quarry. The donation was made at the Aurora Fossil Festival. There is a full post about this in this same Forum.

[sixgill pete]

Also donated at the Aurora Fossil Festival and in the same detailed post as the above tooth, to the Mace Brown Museum of Natural History at the College of Charleston is this tooth. Also from the Oligocene of North Carolina and Belgrade Quarry.

Initially ID'd as Odontocete indet.

[Plantguy]

A couple years ago I donated a partial brissid echinoid and partial crab carapace to the UF/Florida Museum of Nat History, Gainesville, FL.

Early Oligocene, Suwannee Formation, Vulcan Mine, Brooksville, FL

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/37642-vulcan-mine-brooksville-another-echinoid-id/?hl=vulcan

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/44747-vulcan-mine-brooksville-fl-partial-crab/?hl=vulcan

[Gizmo]

Pristichampsus Tooth
Aquia Formation, Potomac River, MD. First published record of this species at this Paleocene site on the Potomac river. Donated to the Calvert Marine Museum, Solomons, MD.

[Bullsnake]

Pennsylvanian period

Eudora shale

Wyandotte county, Kansas USA

Actinopterygian - fish jaw

Found - September 2015

Donated to American Museum of Natural History in New York

Link to original thread - http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/57812-upper-penn-eudora-shale-nodule/

 

[Susan from PA]

Pachycephalosaur Cranial Spikes

Hell Creek Formation

Harding County, South Dakota

Donated to the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Ontario, Canada to be studied by Dr. David Evans

[Tony G.]

Flower
Green River Formation, Parachute Creek Member
Douglas Pass, Colorado.  Radar Dome area.
Denver Museum of Nature and Science.
 
When I first saw this flower, I walked right past it thinking it was a dead flower laying on the rock.  I'm glad something in my head made me go back and take another look.  I realized that this specimen was rare and asked the Denver Museum if they were interested in it.  They were, and the donation was made.

 

 

[digit]

Cookiecutter Shark Teeth (Isistius sp.)

Hawthorn / Okeechobee Group

Okeechobee Formation / Peace River Formation

Sarasota County, FL

Pliocene/Pleistocene (likely) or late Miocene (possibly)

 

While checking with Dr. Richard Hulbert of the Florida Museum of Natural History (FLMNH) about the possible stratigraphy of the locality in which these tiny and delicate shark teeth are found (the beloved and renown "Cookiecutter Creek" as it is known on this forum), I asked Dr. Hulbert if they had any specimens of this species in the museum's collection. He answered back that the museum presently did not have this taxon in their collection and so I pulled out my finds from their little container and mailed them up to Dr. Hulbert. I was hoping to hand these over in person but Hurricane Matthew had other plans and canceled the volunteer dig at the Montbrook site last week so they went off in a padded envelope by post instead.

 

After getting a tour of the collection up at FLMNH it seems hard to imagine that they lack anything that has come out of the ground here in Florida. I was glad to learn that I had something that could fill a hole, albeit a micro-hole, in their collection. These are not the most common of fossil shark teeth so I was glad that I was able to provide a nice assortment to the museum for anybody wishing to study the fossilized teeth from one of my favorite shark families. Maybe one day someone will be able to say with certainty which species of Isistius we are finding here in South Florida (Isistius triangulus or Isistius brazilienses or Isistius sp. nov.). Funny how seeing these specimens off to a good home in an important collection is just as much fun as finding them in the first place.

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

 

 

[dre464]

Plethodid Fish Mouth Plate

Atco Formation (Lower Austin Group, Early Coniacian [Late Cretaceous-Approximately 89 MYA])

Martin Marietta Cement Plant - Midlothian, Texas (Field Trip)

Donated to the American Museum of Natural History in New York

 

I posted a question about this strange specimen I found on a field trip to the Martin Marietta Cement Plant in Midlothian.  JohnJ suggested, based on pieces that he has found, that it could be an uncommon plethodid mouth plate.  He suggested that I send a message to Carl for confirmation.  Carl was happy to confirm that he thought it was a plethodid mouth plate as well.  He requested that I think about donating it for study, since a few other specimens are being examined right now.  I jumped at the chance, since it would only gather dust in my garage!

 

Specimen is below.  Scale is in centimeters...

 

 

 

 

Thanks JohnJ and Carl for the help!

 

Daniel

 

[FossilDudeCO]

Undescribed Fossil Leaf 

Eocene (50myo)

Green River Formation

Lincoln County, Kemmerer, WY

Donated to the Fossil Butte National Monument

 

 

The museum is interested in this piece because it has the vein system of the leaf preserved down to the third set.

This makes a definitive identification possible.

 

This is my first donation to the FBNM. Hopefully of MANY!

[MarcoSr]

I donated over 80 Eocene bird bones from Virginia to the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum in Germany about a year ago.

 

The below post contains pictures of forty three of these donated bird bones:

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/41375-some-eocene-bird-bones-from-my-collection/&page=1

 

Below is a link to a paper written by Dr. Gerald Mayr on these bird bones.

http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12542-016-0330-8

 

One of the bird bones was described as a new species:

Eostrix  gulottai (Owl)

Early Eocene, Nanjemoy Formation

Stafford County, Virginia

Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum, Frankfurt Germany

The specimen was donated so it could be studied and described.   It is a new owl species.

 

Below is a display of pictures of Eostrix gulottai that my wife made for me.

 

 

 

 

Marco Sr.

[oilshale]

 

First record of the Lower Jurassic dragonfly Protomyrmeleon brunonis Geinitz, 1887 from Charmouth, UK donated to "Staatliches Museum für Naturkunde Stuttgart" in Germany.

Three wings super-imposed, without body. So far only known from Dobbertin in Mecklenburg, Germany.

 

 

Lit.:
F. E. Geinitz (1887): Beitrag zur Geologie Mecklenburgs. Archiv des Vereins der Freunde der Naturgeschichte in Mecklenburg 41:143-216

[Ramo]

http://via.library.depaul.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1111&context=csh_etd

 

Link to a paper about a bunch of Codell Sandstone stuff my family and I donated not too long ago.

I posted about this last summer, but I don't see it in this thread, so I thought I'd add it here.

 

There is also a new species of shark named "Squalicorax deckeri" in honor of my family. 

 

Ramo

 

 

[I_gotta_rock]

Isognomon sp.

Miocene Era

Calvert Cliffs, Calvert County, Maryland

Delaware Museum of Natural History, Greenville, Delaware, USA

Donated for study because of its unusual quality. Most specimens are only found as thick hinges and flaking bits of mica-like glitter in the sand. There are some in the museum that feel that Maryland Isognomons, though long identified as I. maxilla based on and Italian holotype, are a different species. This shell is intact enough to describe that species if they are different enough. I'll keep you posted if I hear anything!

 

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/71525-donating-my-beauty/

 

[TNCollector]

Megactenopetalus sp. crown and root

Late Mississippian (Early Carboniferous)

Pennington Formation

East Tennessee, USA

2016

Roughly 1cm per crown

Donated to the American Museum of Natural History: AMNH FF 21096

 

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/71674-donation-megactenopetalus-sp-chimaera-tooth/

[Dsailor]

Name: Ctenecanthus fish spine

Age: Devonian

Location: Gilboa NY, USA 2017

American Museum of Natural History

They asked me if I would be interested in donating the specimen  as it was rare and need professional study and I said "sure, but could you send me an official looking piece of paper from the museum because this is a pretty big deal for me and it made my year".