Potomac Miocene

[RCW3D]

What a cool day! A bunch of us did a beach clean up on the Virginia side of the Potomac River on Saturday and along with the trash, we picked up some of those triangle-shaped "litter" as well. @SailingAlongToo piloted his boat around to ferry us from beach to beach, and his wife who is still recovering from a broken arm joined us out there as well. By the time the day was over, the entire front of his boat was covered in trash bags that we filled up from about 3 1/2 miles of beach. We had a beautiful day to be out there and spied numerous eagles cruising around, and even one making a meal of a striped bass. Before I get to the fossils, I have to mention the coolest piece of trash that I picked up. As you can expect, there were plenty of bottles that has washed up on the various beaches. One of the bottles I reached down and grabbed had something in it, as I looked closer I noticed that there was a paper with writing in it. I opened it up and read a letter from a 4 year old boy named Levi who put his message in a bottle on January 11, 2016. The letter instructed the finder to call his mom or grandmother, so on my way home I did and chatted with a mother who did not know about the letter but was crying when I read it to her. I was glad that I made the call, it really made my day.

 

Now to the fossils, we all found some nice stuff while we were out there. I wish that I took some pictures of the finds that the others had because there were some really coo things found. One woman reached down to pick up some trash and spied a root next to it...out came a beautiful Meg! I ended up finding a nice Mako when I tried to carry 8 bottles back to a bag and dropped one...right on top of the Mako! LOL!

 

Some pictures from our adventure.

 

Our eagle chomping down on the striper. I also have a video of this that I will try to post.

 

 

Eagle tracks

 

 

Jellyfish were everywhere, I blindly reached out to grab a piece of clear plastic that was in my peripheral vision and stuck my hand into a jellyfish...definite "eewww" factor!

 

 

 

My haul for the day

 

 

The tooth on the right was courtesy of dropping the bottle, the one on the left was the last tooth I found.

 

 

Mako in a little drainage

 

 

The message from the bottle

 

 

 

[Fossil-Hound]

Very nice! I enjoyed reading this neat story.

[Coco]

Nice story !

 

Coco

[Miocene_Mason]

Got out on a fossil hunt and made someone happy, nice job!

[Rowboater]

Great trip!

[sixgill pete]

Great teeth and the message in the bottle is fantastic. Glad to see Mrs. SA2 out to hunt.

[SailingAlongToo]

@RCW3D

I thought we agreed you would only take my photo from my "skinny" side?   Nice photos of the eagle. It was neat watching him walk with a talon latched onto that big slab of fish. I do enjoy wandering the beach there with you. We will have to try some other places over the winter. Of course, @Daleksec will surely want to tag along.

 

@sixgill pete it was Mrs.SA2's first time out since her surgery. She had some difficulty getting on and off the boat but is building up her confidence level again as I had her back out this past Saturday for a few hours and we did a "walk in." She is still under strict orders not to use her left arm for anything, at least till early Dec.