Greetings from Oklahoma (needing help identifying ....)

[pjullien]

Phil from Tulsa, Oklahoma here.  I am needing help identifying the following in the photos (2 log sized objects...one is about 3 feet and the other about 2 feet..heavily pitted.  The smaller one has a central core pattern (light but visible).  Found on lakeshore in NE Oklahoma.   In your opinion, rock, fossilized wood, or other.  The pieces are very hard-I haven't done a hardness test but it felt like stone and was extremely heavy.

[Fossildude19]

Welcome to the Forum.  

To me, these look like differentially weathered/water eroded rocks. 

Not seeing any definitive characteristics.

 

Any other plant fossils found in the area? 

[Rockwood]

If other evidence indicated this to be a shoreline at some period traces left by boring bivalves could be considered.

[Auspex]

My impression, despite their highly organic appearance, is that they are weathered limestone.

They are pretty interesting in any case, and I would have brought them home as examples of Ma Nature's art.

[pjullien]

Thank you!

 

[pjullien]

Tim,

This was along a major lake and yes there are a variety of plant fossils around the point.  

 

Rockwood,

That makes sense as there is an extremely high concentration of bivalve fossils all around!  Thank you for that info!

 

Auspex,

 

I have a couple of other interesting pics to show in the same area.  Thanks for the input!

 

 

[Plantguy]

I agree with Tim/Auspex that it looks like a weathering/erosional feature--probably a carbonate cemented sedimentary rock/limestone. I like the photos! The bottom of that one layer has an interesting irregularly laminated/banded look/textured feature to it...I wonder if that is just more weathering or something else? Hard to really see in the pictures...maybe you noticed. Did you break any of these open or see any fresh broken faces of the rocks to see what they are made of or whats going on internally...you are more likely to find plant fossils in the sandy/shaley type rocks. 

Your photos also caught my eye with that unique color as I have a similar yellowish fragment of a lycopod plant root--Stigmaria from out that away. It differs from yours in that it shows spirally arranged holes in it--where the rootlets attached to the main structure...I dont think I see that spiraling in your photos, nor a similar sized pitting. Here's a couple shots of that piece that I bought awhile back. I was told  it came from Mayes County, OK.  Note the end view (where I'm holding it) shows the grainey nature of the sandstone...

Side view:

Panorama showing end/top/bottom views.

Thanks for showing us your field shots--great stuff! 

 

Regards, Chris

 

 

[pjullien]

Thanks for the comments!