February hunt in "les Vaches Noires"

[elcoincoin]

Les Vaches Noires is a french famous hunting spot, well known for its Callovian and Oxfordian clays. Some really nice stuff has been found there end of 2016, including croc bones and teeth and plesiosaur bones.

Unfortunately, I diddnt got the opportunity to go hunt there during that time. My fist opening windows was during february high tide but i didnt manage to find any reptile stuff.

heres a link to the flickr album of this hunt : https://flic.kr/s/aHsktr4d4K

So here a global picture of the site.

Either you hunt at the bottom of the cliff or on the beach when the clay layer isnt covered by sand.

On the left :the beach layer as the tide covering it back :

A few in situ pictures :

wood (unfortunately most of time hard to preserve)

Ammonites (same, depending on the layer they belong to, they often cant be saved)

A pyritized small one in situ

and a few gastropods (those can be find by dozens in certain layers)

Despite i didnt any reptile stuff, the hunt after cleaning appeared to be quite good. some snarge nicely preserved gastropods and bivalves.

Here's an appetizer and one of the catch of the day:

Gastropod "Pleurotomaria munsterii" with a crinoid article on it :

Regards

[Fossildude19]

Looks like a fun time in a lovely area.

The last association is quite pretty.

Did you find many of the smaller pyritized ammonites?

There looks like there may be two more in that picture.

Thank you for the great report.

Regards,

[elcoincoin]

Here comes a sample of specimen collected during those 2 days to illustrate the diversity of the spot.

a few of the pleurotomaria

an indet gastropod on left and a classical Pleurotomaria munsteri :

2 emblematic bivalves of the place, the preservation is very good on those 2

Myophorella sp gr irregularis :

and Trigonia elongata

the brachiiopod : Gallienithyris galliennei

The ursin :Nucleolites scutatus

the crinoid : Milericrinus horridus

The nicest ammo of the day : Quenstedtoceras praelamberti

Belemnite : Pachytheutis abbreviata

coral : Thecosmilia annularis

and a fish vertebra :

More stuff here on TFF : http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/gallery/album/1819-vaches-noires-feb-2016/

or on flickr : https://flic.kr/s/aHsktr4d4K

regards

[Jeffrey P]

Looks like some great finds. The ammonite, gastropods, and bivalves are particularly impressive. Congratulations. Thanks for posting.

[FossilDAWG]

Fossil heaven: beautiful fossils, beautiful setting. I wish there was a site like that on this side of the Atlantic. Thanks for the tour.

Don

[nala]

Sympa les trouvailles!

[Ridgehiker]

Thanks for sharing.

All great finds however my favourite are the Pleurotomaria. I've never found one with epifauna...yours is a great specimen with the crinoid attached. This group, the 'slit shells' are still around today. I have modern Pleurotamaria shells that don't' Look any different from specimens from the Paleozoic.

[Darktooth]

Very nice finds! Love the ammo!

[taj]

True , 2016 was really nice up there . I was lucky enough to be able to get there at the time . No findings that measure up to the feats local achieved, but very nice nonetheless . Next try en of this week .....

[DinoMike]

That Quenstedtoceras ammonite is amazing!

[Manticocerasman]

nice pictures and finds .

I love the trigonia's.

[vonfatman]

Congratulations on some very cool finds.

I really enjoyed the photographs.

Bob

[JustPlainPetrified]

That last ammo is a beauty!

[elcoincoin]

Bumping this thread with an ammonite found during this hunt and that i i just finished prepping.

Its a Cardioceras, ill edit the post if i got more sure about specie

It doesnt come from the callovian clay but from the oxfordian oolith above

[JustPlainPetrified]

Wow! nice find and prepping.

[Fossildude19]

Well done - it's a beauty!

Regards,

[sixgill pete]

What a beautiful location and amazing finds.

[elcoincoin]

Another bump of this thread with the finds of my 2 last trips to les Vaches Noires. Both time i spent 3 days and did 4 or 5 tides each time. Getting up at 6 for the morning tide, starting with the headband lamp.

But with the summer there, my trips there will spot till the autumn big tides.... Too many hunters for now there !

Group view of the best pyritized ammos found during those trips (exept the biggest one found in february) : mostly Quenstedtoceras

The finest one :

Group view of the most common gastropods from the "beach layers" (callovian) : Encyclus meriani

A set of Pleurotomaria, another gastropod genus from those layers

a fine Pleurotomaria munsteri

the 2 emblematic bivalves from the site :

Myophorella sp gr irregularis

and Trigonia elongata

A pirytized phragmocone :

A nice sample of the brachiopod Gallienithyris galliennei, most are to be found crushed.....

Fossilized wood with oysters shells

And last but not least even if partial.... croc tooth (woho!)

You can see more stuff in my TFF galery : there

or on my flickr : here

I hope you enjoyed the normandy trip !

I may do a last bump later with 2 ammos being cleaned at the moment....

[Ludwigia]

Nice finds!!

[Shamalama]

Very nice finds, thank you for sharing. It appears that you do a lot of digging to find all those fossils. The Wood with Oyster association is really great. How do you preserve something like that?

[elcoincoin]

Hardly no digging at all, just ground picking stuff.

This piece of wood will prolly wont preserve and will just shattered, but from time to time you find a piece that wont move over time. Pretty sure the other one in galery will stay just as it is

[Wrangellian]

Is it not effective to add some glue to preserve a piece that will crumble?

[elcoincoin]

Very random, for now the process has stopped but im pretty sure at some point it will just crumble. Most likely the salt is responsible for this

[Everhardus]

Lovely, hope to get there myself some day !!

[amour 25]

Nice stuff, looks mysterious in that first picture.