SW Florida Fossil Hunting Trip- Day 2

[JBMugu]

I wanted to share some pictures from a recent trip to SW Florida. I grew up in FL but I didn’t do any fossil hunting until I moved to CA and found Shark Tooth Hill. I was really excited to get out and find some Florida fossils. Unfortunately, the Peace River was too high to hunt so we have to explore some smaller rivers that weren’t too flooded. That worked out for me because we found some great fossils! Some members of the forum were nice enough to show me around. I sent out a box of STH finds to my FL friends to get some fossil goodwill going. I think some of them were posted for ID in another thread. I really enjoyed what to me was easy digging in the Florida creeks, it was kind of hot out for February but the weather was great for being in the water. I was really surprised about the diversity of fossils found, at one point on the bank we found an area that had both land and marine fossils in the same layer. You could walk around and just pick cool stuff up. That is where I found the Giant Armadillo jaw section that won the fossil of the month. It was a nice contrast to STH where you tend to find the same type of fossils over and over. I hope you enjoy the pictures.

[JBMugu]

The first picture is the jaw sections, the second picture is (I believe) 3 horse teeth, a bison tooth, two gator teeth, a large gator scute, and a fish vert.

 here are some more pictures of the teeth

[JBMugu]

Here are pictures of a piece of a turtle shell and an opossum jaw.

[JBMugu]

This is a picture of all the small teeth/shells/bones we found

[JBMugu]

Here is what I think is part of a large fish skull, let me know what you think

[JBMugu]

Here is a close up of the large gator tooth. I really like this one...

[JBMugu]

In all I think we were only in the creek for about 4 hours. Most of the finds came in the last 45 min. I have to say one of the best fossil hunting days I have ever had. More to come from the other days. Thanks

 

Jesse

[Tidgy's Dad]

What an incredible haul in such a short period of time! 

Amazing! Some wonderful finds.

Agree with fish skull section. 

[Al Dente]

I think your fish skull is an alligator parietal.

[Harry Pristis]

3 minutes ago, Al Dente said:

I think your fish skull is an alligator parietal.

 

Good catch.  I agree it's 'gator.

 

[JBMugu]

Thanks for the update on the ID, I thought fish skull because it looked similar to some STH material I have but Florida is a totally new area for me. It makes sense though, I think I pulled 4 gator teeth from that area.

 

Jesse

[Darktooth]

Great finds! I was down there last week and had a blast. Congratulations on a successful hunt!

[jcbshark]

Beautiful finds Jesse, is that possum jaw fossil too?

[ynot]

Nice haul, congratulations on the fun day hunting.

[Shellseeker]

19 hours ago, JBMugu said:

In all I think we were only in the creek for about 4 hours. Most of the finds came in the last 45 min. I have to say one of the best fossil hunting days I have ever had. More to come from the other days. Thanks

 

Jesse

Fantastic Day of fossil hunting.... really unique.

Your observation is mine also... when I am digging 6 hours on a full day, for long periods I tend to find 1-3 small shark teeth in a sieve and THEN for 15 or 20 minutes I am finding LOTS of fossils in each sieve, and then while I am frantically trying to follow the "vein" of fossil rich gravel, it peters out back to 1-3 small shark teeth per sieve.

It the theory that even a blind squirrel stumbles thru pockets of gravel occasionally.  Persistence counts.

[fossi59]

Great finds. Congratulations.

[JBMugu]

22 hours ago, jcbshark said:

Beautiful finds Jesse, is that possum jaw fossil too?

I believe so, it was found when I started digging in the reddish layer on the side of the creek. A lot of material was coming out of that section.

 

Jesse

[jcbshark]

1 hour ago, JBMugu said:

I believe so, it was found when I started digging in the reddish layer on the side of the creek. A lot of material was coming out of that section.

 

Jesse

Sweet, teeth in the jaw are one of my favorite things to find