brachiomyback Posted June 30, 2009 Share Posted June 30, 2009 With all he recent “hot” weather here is a “cooler” old trip to the Green Mill Run, Greenville, NC, last January. Digging with Frosty…. Work once again brought me to the GMR area (Kinston) last Friday. Explained to the wife I really didn’t want to fight the Friday evening Raleigh rush hour traffic back, but she was no fool and knew what I was fishing for. So with a “forged” kitchen pass I spent the night in an area hotel with dreams of 3” great whites in my screen. I wasn’t hoping for much considering I found my biggest tooth (2-3/4 inch Carcharocles auriculoatus) in addition to my second largest tooth / largest Carcharodon carcharias (2-1/2 inches) on my last trip at the Run. As long as I found something in good condition or unique, I knew my fossil cravings would be satisfied. I pulled into the playground / baseball field lot around 7:00 a.m. and parked the only vehicle to be seen. I geared up and was off to uncover some buried treasure. Still being a creature of habit, I made my way to my secret location….lol (10th Street Bridge). This was the area of GMR that attracted me since discovering the GMR fossil cornucopia on http://www.ecphora.net/mgs/gmr.htm And yes…it still continues to attract me in addition to giving up its bounty. On my way there I noticed something rare in this neck of the woods… a snowman. I hoped this was a good omen. I decided to work the tunnel again with my graduated screen basket; however, this time in conjunction with my smaller screen 1/4" screen to see what finds went through my 1/2 inch screen on my prior dig. Right off the bat I found what I believe is my first pathological tooth, a great white with a fat old root and some tip feeding damage. If the tip was intact, it would have measure 1-3/4 inches (in addition to a little help from a tooth stretcher). I’m thinking it’s pathological because the tooth has a unique torque like twist to it. Now that I was satisfied with a decent find, the other fossils found would be just icing on the cake. While scooping gravel in the tunnel I notice a “round” rock that kept eluding my shovel. I thought to myself that this was a uniquely shaped round rock. So I stopped shoveling and fished it out of the water. I couldn’t believe what I thought I found and verified it when I brought it out in the light, my first whale caudal (tail) vertebrae that measured exactly 4 inches. If the tunnel was frozen it would have made for one hell of a hockey puck. Later I found a very cool piece of bone material with predation marks all over it. The side bite still showed the serration marks in the groove, so I am assuming great white feeding. The upper marks were about 1” apart so based on dentition measurements on www.elasmo.com I’m thinking is was about a 10 footer. I found my largest in addition to being a heart breaker (damaged root) goblin shark (Scapanorhynchus texanus) that just went over 1-3/4 inches. My other unique find was an old green glass “D-patent” (produced from 1938 to 1951) Coke bottle from New Bern, NC. FYI…The birthplace of PEPSI is located in New Bern, North Carolina and was first invented by Caleb Bradham in his pharmacy in 1898. New Bern is the second-oldest town in North Carolina (1710). The oldest town is Bath, incorporated in 1705. It had a little feeding…I mean sipping damage on the bottom. But other than that and in addition to being rolled in the gravel for who knows how long, I thought it was a cool find. Plus less future broken glass down stream (got about 3 small annoying cuts this trip). Also found a cool piece of drift wood / tree root that was hollow. In all I found about 200+ beaters for the nieces and nephews and about 20+ decent smaller / intact ones along with the usual haul of belemnites, a beautiful small GW, some pycnodont teeth, some whale ear bone (tympanic bulla) partials, some rays teeth, various bone material, shells in addition to a yellow marble and 8 cents for my daughter. No lucky penny finds this trip, but all in all I have no reason to complain. - Brad Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted June 30, 2009 Share Posted June 30, 2009 Another well crafted tale from the tunnel! "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cris Posted July 1, 2009 Share Posted July 1, 2009 Another great trip report! Always enjoy reading your posts. . .That bone with the feeding marks on it is unreal...very cool piece. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mommabetts Posted July 2, 2009 Share Posted July 2, 2009 At least you didn't have to split them with Frosty. Nive finds!!!!!!!!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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