Ammonites from Somerset, UK

[Aurelius]

Went out on a hunting trip at the weekend, and came away with quite a few decent finds. These are all in-land finds from locations near Ilminster, and the finds are all from the Toarcian pediod (182-174m years ago).

 

Please forgive me having forgotten most of the names of the ammonites, I'm not great at remembering them.

This ammonite, a Dactylioceras of some kind, is covered in clay which is absolutely full of what appear to be trace fossils from worm activity. This isn't uncommon, but I've rarely seen such a vivid example.

 

 

Close up:

 

 

The rear of this large, crushed harpoceras is a jumble of mixed up fossil bits, which you often find in the various layers of the beacon limestone. Top left there is quite an interesting bit of shell, which looks as if it might perhaps be part of a crushed teuthid phragmocone. 

 

A nice little double-dac.

 

 

This is one of the scarcer ammonites from this location (I've forgotten the name), especially at this large size. I have one or two locations I can go to and stand a chance of finding these. They are often heavily re-worked, and this specimen was obviously exposed after fossilisation and heavily rolled on the seabed. It's structurally sound, but the shell - which seems to have been originally preserved - has been almost completely worn away. Such a shame!

 

 

[Aurelius]

I found this harpoceras in-situ (normally they are found loose).

 

These (some sort of hildoceras I think) are very common and can be found in absolutely perfect condition. This is a rather average example.

 

 

This one illustrates the jumbled nature of the material often found here.

 

 

 

[Aurelius]

 

 

This is a nice big one - it'll take some prep with the air pen and the air abrader. If the centre is complete, it should look nice. The rock here often has a lot of iron in it, and this sometimes seems to eat into the ammonites, leaving big holes. This one looks OK, at least superficially.

 

[Aurelius]

Cheating now, because I found this big block around six weeks ago. If I expose the ammonite properly, it might be an attractive piece. 

 

[Ludwigia]

Thanks for sharing these things.  Although the fauna is familiar, it's not very often that you see them from this area. It's interesting to see how different the preservation is compared to the ones to be found on the Yorkshire coast, southwest Germany or central France. Depositional and taphonomic circumstances play a major role in creating the differences. Apparently the Junction Bed, where I'm assuming these were found, is a condensed sequence which squeezes 4 million years into less than one meter of rock down at the Jurassic coast, whereas the same timescale is represented in Yorkshire by 100 meters of black shale.

[Aurelius]

11 minutes ago, Ludwigia said:

Thanks for sharing these things.  Although the fauna is familiar, it's not very often that you see them from this area. It's interesting to see how different the preservation is compared to the ones to be found on the Yorkshire coast, southwest Germany or central France. Depositional and taphonomic circumstances play a major role in creating the differences. Apparently the Junction Bed, where I'm assuming these were found, is a condensed sequence which squeezes 4 million years into less than one meter of rock down at the Jurassic coast, whereas the same timescale is represented in Yorkshire by 100 meters of black shale.

 

Yes, it is the Junction Bed, or the Beacon Limestone as it's now known. In the area where I collect, the rock is around 5 meters thick, so it is still heavily condensed. There is a lot of re-working and weathering too, although some beautiful examples can be found. Unfortunately, unlike in Yorkshire, there are no bones to be found, nor any evidence of vertebrate animals whatsoever (although I do have some possible fragments of hybodont fin spines)

[ynot]

Nice finds.'Thanks for sharing.

[lcordova]

Really nice....the ammos from there are superb looking

[Wrangellian]

Love that piece with the ichnofossils. Good to display as is. Interesting about the difference in sequence thickness.

[Monica]

What a fantastic variety of ammonites from one area - congratulations!!!

[Everhardus]

Love it ! I would very much like to do some hunting in the UK again.....