Lower Carboniferous/Mississippian Shark Tooth Hunt

[Archie]

Some fenestella bryozoans:

 

 

[Archie]

The P. acuminatus in-situ and a close up. Ive removed most of the matrix covering it now and its complete but I'm going to need to cut it off the massive block its on so I can get it under the microscope to do the finer prep:

 

[Archie]

A nicely preserved brachiopod with both valves:

 

[Archie]

And finally the Cladodont tooth as found. Some of the surface of the tooth came away with the spit and stayed on the counterpart so I'll keep this and at some point stick it back on and prep it out to have it complete. Ive identified this tooth as Saivodus (formerly Cladododus) striatus. This is only the third complete and by far the largest and best specimen Ive found of this species, it appears to only be missing the very tip of the central cusp.

[Archie]

I'll get some pics up of the finished results on these teeth shortly, thanks for looking

[JimB88]

Thats a huge Cladodont! Cant wait to see it prepped!

 

[Fossildude19]

Awesome teeth, Sam!  

Cant wait to see them prepped.   

Regards, 

 

[Archie]

Thanks guys Ive nearly finished the Saivodus just got to tidy it up a bit and cut a base for displaying it. Forgot to mention the size is 24mm across the base and 17mm from the base to the tip of the central cusp. Here it is so far, I'm pretty chuffed with it

[ynot]

Way cool!!

That is a really nice find.

[Archie]

Thanks Tony

[deutscheben]

Archie, you are knocking it out of the park over there! Another splendid tooth, and I can't wait to see the Petalodus prepped.

[FossilDAWG]

What an amazing tooth!

 

Don

[Brett Breakin' Rocks]

Wow .. that tooth is amazing.  Looking at the profile of that tooth and imagining a mouth full of those teeth must have made for one wicked bite !

[Archie]

10 hours ago, deutscheben said:

Archie, you are knocking it out of the park over there! Another splendid tooth, and I can't wait to see the Petalodus prepped.

 

Thanks! I think this is by far the most productive site for teeth Ive ever hunted! Ive just finished the Petalodus this morning so will post it shortly

 

9 hours ago, FossilDAWG said:

What an amazing tooth!

 

Don

 

Thank you

 

8 hours ago, Brett Breakin' Rocks said:

Wow .. that tooth is amazing.  Looking at the profile of that tooth and imagining a mouth full of those teeth must have made for one wicked bite !

 

Thanks! That's exactly what I was thinking lol!

[Archie]

Heres a close up of the Petalodus acuminatus after prep, Ive decided to leave the ossicle and bryozoan(?) overlying the one end of it for aesthetic purposes. This is a lateral tooth in lingual view and is 20mm across.

 

 

[Archie]

And the tooth on its matrix as I'm displaying it:

 

 

[Carl]

Spectacular! 

[Fossildude19]

Sam, 

Wonderful finds and prep work. 

What tools are you using for your prepping?

Sorry if you've mentioned this before. 

Regards,

[JimB88]

Wow..those are great! Certainly 'chuff' worthy...whatever that means

[Archie]

8 hours ago, Carl said:

Spectacular! 

 

Thanks Carl!

 

8 hours ago, Fossildude19 said:

Sam, 

Wonderful finds and prep work. 

What tools are you using for your prepping?

Sorry if you've mentioned this before. 

Regards,

 

Thanks Tim!

With this limestone I use acetic acid to weaken the matrix, sharpened needles to scrape it away under a microscope and if necessary small grinding discs to remove matrix more quickly till I'm almost at the tooth.

 

7 hours ago, JimB88 said:

Wow..those are great! Certainly 'chuff' worthy...whatever that means

 

Haha cheers Jim!

[Archie]

I haven't had a chance to post for a while due to work and other commitments but over the past few weeks Ive made some nice discoveries and thought it was time to share them here. Ive recently found a new marine site nearby which is another 19th century limestone quarry that exploited the same bed of limestone, the Charlestown Main. This site has so far only yielded petalodonts but interestingly scales and other miscellaneous fishy bits are pretty common which Ive never come across much of in marine beds of this age before. Heres the best of the three species Ive found here so far.

 

First of all the most common tooth at the site and I believe in the Lower Carboniferous marine rocks of Scotland, Petalodus acuminatus. This is a lateral tooth in labial view and is 11 x 12mm:

 

[Archie]

Next up is a new species for me which I think may be a Petalorynchus sp. Its basically spoon shaped with the crown convex on the labial side and concave on the lingual side. This specimen is in labial view and is 9mm x 6mm.

[Archie]

This is my favorite tooth from this site so far, a large Ctenopetalus serratus complete with a rare jellyfish impression. The bedding plane this tooth was on seems to have been open to the elements for a long time and was full of mud and plant roots, the tooth itself was on both halves of the split:

[Archie]

But after a good clean and sticking both halves back together to dig out from one side it turned out really nice, the tooth is in labial view and is 28mm x 14mm. The jellyfish is to the left of the tooth and is only really visible as a vague circle with radial lines.

[Archie]

And finally my most recent tooth found yesterday at the first quarry, a nice near complete specimen of Saivodus striatus at 19mm x 22mm. The water level in the flooded section of this quarry is lower than I have ever seen it after a record dry Winter and Spring and this tooth was found on a block on the newly formed bank. When I first spotted it I was disappointed to see it was broken but after prep its turned out to be only missing the lateral cusp on the far right side and one of the best of this species Ive found. Tooth as found: