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Unusual feature of a piece of pet wood


AngieM357

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Howdy! Just about every piece of the metric tons I've collected have, pretty much, fits into a neat category of: broken and irregular end, smooth surfaces, weathered and jagged, or tumbled and rounded. But I found something a couple of days ago that I've never seen before and rather than trying to settle on one wild hypothesis, I thought I'd ask the experts!

 

This piece was found near a body of water in Brazos County, TX in the Yegua. It looks as if it would have been a general cube shape, except for one corner that's missing. I'm also puzzled due to the direction of the grain.

 

Here's my conundrum. I don't think it was broken post-petrification. I've never seen a broken surface with this texture. Hopefully, you can see the lighter colored sort of ring that follows the edge of the missing corner. I've found some pieces where it looks like it was the end of a limb that broke off of a larger limb and, in my experiences so far, none looked like this.

 

Am I just hoping for something unusual, or is this just a normal thing I've never seen before and, if so, what is it? I think I did okay with the images, but let me know if you need/want additional pics or whatever. Thank you so much for looking and helping out if you can!

 

 

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I am totally uneducated when it comes to petrified wood and am only taking a stab in the dark. I see a geological rock that mimics wood. The broken corner shows no structure that I would expect on the cross section of wood that is petrified. 

 

 Mike

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Just a semi-educated guess on my part too, but I have some pieces of pet wood and this just looks like an old weathered/abraded surface of a formerly larger piece that has broken into bits. After it broke up the newer surfaces were exposed that you see on the rest of the piece. The original piece of wood may have been tumbled and abraded in a river or suchlike, before being buried, hence the rough surface at an angle to the grain. The lighter color is how far the weathering penetrated (post-petrification, I think) before it was broken up.

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Light colored rinds are common on obsidian, agate, chert and silicified wood. The rinds are formed on weathered surfaces where the silica becomes hydrated (opalized).

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6 hours ago, AngieM357 said:

but let me know if you need/want additional pics or whatever. 

I tend to agree with Wrangellian's assessment. A closer look (larger file) at the textural detail would increase confidence though.

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I don't see any inclusions of anything as far as opalized veins, calcite, amber, or chalcedony. This particular piece isn't agatized  The piths and xylem are very pronounced on all surfaces except for that one weird corner. At any rate, I'll see how many full-res representative photos I can put up...

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(wow. that's really not great. my new Nikon will be here sometime today and it'll do good macros. maybe i can redo them later today.)

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26 minutes ago, AngieM357 said:

I don't see any inclusions of anything as far as opalized veins, calcite, amber, or chalcedony. This particular piece isn't agatized  The piths and xylem are very pronounced on all surfaces except for that one weird corner. At any rate, I'll see how many full-res representative photos I can put up...

20190219_194411.jpg

(wow. that's really not great. my new Nikon will be here sometime today and it'll do good macros. maybe i can redo them later today.)

I think the macros would be very helpful. Both of the ends and the darker side material.

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18 minutes ago, ynot said:

Wondering if this is an example of slickensides?

That's geology, though, right? This is 100% guaranteed pet wood.

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19 minutes ago, ynot said:

Wondering if this is an example of slickensides?

That's what I was thinking, except I've never encountered a specimen with slickensides on two nearly right angle surfaces.

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59 minutes ago, AngieM357 said:

That's geology, though, right? This is 100% guaranteed pet wood.

We all live in different locales and the material we find is vastly different. Since you are familiar with finding this material, would you please help us a bit by providing additional information?

 

For instance, you mention xylem and pith and with the luxury of holding it in your hand you can probably see those features. For me, xylem in Lycopsids is vastly different and inherently more apparent.

 

The material I find does not have growth rings (300-325 million years old), unless you are finding palm your specimens (34-56 million years old) should most likely exhibit growth ring structure like modern trees. It would be great to see those growth rings if so.

 

Is it found in float on the surface or do you dig it up? Yours looks remarkably clean so I am guessing it is floating on the surface.

 

Any idea as to which geologic formations it is associated with? Yegua Formation?

 

It does not look Pennsylvanian era, so is it Permian or younger?  Maybe Eocene?

 

Lastly, as you find a lot of it, what type of petrified wood do you believe it to be? For instance, it does not appear to be palm wood. Snakewood? Conifer?

 

Thank you, Kato

 

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, Kato said:

We all live in different locales and the material we find is vastly different. Since you are familiar with finding this material, would you please help us a bit by providing additional information?

I'm not trying to sound condescending at all, so please don't take it that way, I'm just not sure how familiar you are with some stuff. I'm in the ecological restoration / rangeland ecology & management / natural resource management / watershed management industry so I have some background - in living beings! Ha. I am definitely NOT a paleobotanist!

 

For instance, you mention xylem and pith and with the luxury of holding it in your hand you can probably see those features. For me, xylem in Lycopsids is vastly different and inherently more apparent.

Yes, I can see them clearly. I guess "apparent" is kind of subjective so we might have different ideas.

 

The material I find does not have growth rings (300-325 million years old), unless you are finding palm your specimens (34-56 million years old) should most likely exhibit growth ring structure like modern trees. It would be great to see those growth rings if so.

This is an interesting point to discuss, I guess. I've talked to so many people who say they're finding palm and, in 4 years of combing waterways and outcroppings and collecting so much that it literally takes up 1/4 of my garage with milk crates stacked 5' high with log segments around the edge of my front porch, I have found two small pieces of palm, verified by Mayborn Museum at Baylor University. My boyfriend and I examined this piece I posted about pretty closely and we're thinking dicot. (He has a forestry degree and is a park ranger / interp in Grand Teton NP so he knows quite a bit more than I do about dendrology.) The formation, we think, is consistent with many images we've found from reputable online sources showing characteristics belonging to dicots from the Eocene in the Yegua.

 

Is it found in float on the surface or do you dig it up? Yours looks remarkably clean so I am guessing it is floating on the surface.

This piece was partially buried in a creek bank that was eroded under some roots, the topsoil, and surface vegetation.

 

Any idea as to which geologic formations it is associated with? Yegua Formation?

This area is Yegua, yes.

 

It does not look Pennsylvanian era, so is it Permian or younger?  Maybe Eocene?

Upper Eocene, from all the documentation I've read and discussions with professors.

 

Lastly, as you find a lot of it, what type of petrified wood do you believe it to be? For instance, it does not appear to be palm wood. Snakewood? Conifer?

Almost everything we find, I'm pretty sure, is snakewood. I am slowly going through the crates, separated by collection location, and doing my best to utilize what I've learned - largely in part of scouring the posts here! Between all of my responsibilities and other factors, sometimes it's hard to just sit down and go through them, you know? The structure of this piece, however, isn't consistent with snakewood. Who knows how many other pieces I've found of this same type; this one stood out because of the odd corner.

 

Thank you, Kato

No, thank YOU. I really appreciate your interest and y'all's willingness to help. I love learning from y'all. I'm trying to set up everything to take those macros.

 

 

 

 

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Maybe it's juglandaceous wood, something in the line of Engelhardioxylon?

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10 minutes ago, abyssunder said:

Maybe it's juglandaceous wood, something in the line of Engelhardioxylon?

I'll tell you one thing: I am incredibly exhausted from poring through scientific articles and reference books written 100 years ago when you know the species and possibly family has changed - eight or nine times - the way taxonomists are! Heh. Y'all are giving me great jumping-off points, though, and I love it.

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