Des Plaines Valley (Illinois) Geological Society Rock / Fossil Show

[Nimravis]

Today I went to two different Rock / Mineral / Fossil Shows today, I will post each one separately. The Des Plaines Valley Geological Show is a small show, but with small shows you can find some nice / different things, but that was not the case today. I did visit this show last year and posted a report and many of the same fossils that were available then were still available today. I will go back to this show next year to see if there is something that strikes my fancy (First time I ever typed that phrase- LOL).

 

Here are some overall pics of the show and some of the fossils.

 

 

[ynot]

Sweetness!

Loving the green trilos.

[Nimravis]

5 hours ago, ynot said:

Sweetness!

Loving the green trilos.

Lol- people say they sell as do molded Mazon Creek critters, those look nice, but nothing I need.

[olorotitan]

Thanks for the pics, I will have to pay attention for fossils in my local gem / mineral show coming soon.  

 

I think I need the plush trilobites more than actual ones at the moment

[Joe_17]

What were these?

 

[Tidgy's Dad]

On 4/8/2019 at 1:53 PM, Joe_17 said:

What were these?

You mean the bones or the bits at the front?

I've no idea about the bones, but the pieces in shale at the front would appear to be graptolites from Bendigo, Victoria, Australia.

Very nice and I have a few. 

[Tidgy's Dad]

One or two nice pieces, Ralph, but no jaw droppers and the prices seem a bit high. 

Thanks for sharing and going to the effort of taking all the photos for us. 

[Joe_17]

Yes i meant the bones .

[Nimravis]

@Joe_17 and @Tidgy's Dad as an FYI, the 2 plates on the bottom right of the pic were Id’d as Tropisternus sculptilis (Beetle Larvae) from the Eocene Green River Formation of Wyoming. The other plate was a hash plate, don’t know the age. The bones were all identified as Bison.

[Joe_17]

Man i wish i could have gone to one of these .Where can i find out when upcoming shows are in Illinois?

[Nimravis]

3 hours ago, Joe_17 said:

Man i wish i could have gone to one of these .Where can i find out when upcoming shows are in Illinois?

On 5-25 and 5-26, there is a real nice show at the Kane County Fairgrounds - “Chicagoland Gem & Mineral Show”.

 

Also look up the Southern Illinois Earth Science Club- I missed this show that that was on last weekend in Marion, Illinois. I visited it last year and was very please with this show.

 

 

[Mark Kmiecik]

I thought the ESCONI show was at the DuPage County fairgrounds in Wheaton, Illinois? Was held on the 23rd and 24th of March this year. If your primary interest is fossils this show is mandatory among all the shows in Illinois. Plus the sheer mass of Mazon Creek fossils available for sale and at regular and silent auction is amazing. The most amazing part of this show is the club member displays of the best of Mazon Creek material you will ever see gathered in one location, unless you have access to the research collections at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago or the Illinois State Museum in Springfield. I have been fortunate to have seen all of them. The Field Museum's collection will take about three or four days at 8-10 hours per day if you want to see them all without rushing. It is totally mind-boggling. At the ESCONI show you can probably see 50-60% of the entire Mazon Creek biota.

[Nimravis]

3 hours ago, Mark Kmiecik said:

thought the ESCONI show was at the DuPage County

It is held there, the show I mentioned above is the Southern Illinois Earth Science Club in Marion, it is about 4 times larger than the ESCONI Show and you can see some outstanding pieces of flora from down there, probably the best I have ever seen. Look up my post from last year and you will see some pics.

[Nimravis]

3 hours ago, Mark Kmiecik said:

The most amazing part of this show is the club member displays of the best of Mazon Creek material you will ever see gathered in one location,

I agree they have some nice stuff, but I think Dave’s Down to Earth Rock Shop in Evanston is unmatched for examples of Mazon Creek fossils.

[Mark Kmiecik]

2 minutes ago, Nimravis said:

It is held there, the show I mentioned above is the Southern Illinois Earth Science Club in Marion, it is about 4 times larger than the ESCONI Show and you can see some outstanding pieces of flora from down there, probably the best I have ever seen. Look up my post from last year and you will see some pics.

I must have misread.

[Joe_17]

On 4/11/2019 at 6:07 PM, Mark Kmiecik said:

I thought the ESCONI show was at the DuPage County fairgrounds in Wheaton, Illinois? Was held on the 23rd and 24th of March this year. If your primary interest is fossils this show is mandatory among all the shows in Illinois. Plus the sheer mass of Mazon Creek fossils available for sale and at regular and silent auction is amazing. The most amazing part of this show is the club member displays of the best of Mazon Creek material you will ever see gathered in one location, unless you have access to the research collections at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago or the Illinois State Museum in Springfield. I have been fortunate to have seen all of them. The Field Museum's collection will take about three or four days at 8-10 hours per day if you want to see them all without rushing. It is totally mind-boggling. At the ESCONI show you can probably see 50-60% of the entire Mazon Creek biota.

How did you get to see them?

[Mark Kmiecik]

48 minutes ago, Joe_17 said:

How did you get to see them?

I asked. Back in the 70's things were just a bit more laid back than they are now. I was in there quite a lot in '71 at the Field Museum, checking out the fossils that were display in the hall. About 8 or 9 times in one month and was noticed by one of the palaeontological assistants who said hi (on weekdays I had the whole place pretty much to myself) and I said something stupid like "Is this all there is?" and he said "No there's a lot more" and I said "Where is it?" and I was led downstairs to where heaven lies. That was at the Field in Chicago. I was going to the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle at the time studying Chemistry and that probably helped that I had a student ID which I showed. It was quite easy. I suppose nowadays you need FBI clearance or something on that order. Illinois State Museum I visited in '87 as I was researching Mazon Creek as I began my collecting. I called ahead of time, spoke with the curator of collections on the phone, explained why I would like to see the Mazon Creek specimen collection, and made arrangements for a date that was convenient for them. At that point I was well past being a student. I just sort of "shmoozed" my way in. At the Field I was escorted and attended by staff almost the entire time and viewed all the fossils, not only Mazon. I gave up after four days and about 1/3 the collection including Mazon specimens, but that was before I got into collecting Mazon Creek. I had a collection of fossils I had found as a kid and a teenager and a huge collection of rocks and minerals from all over the country that family, friends and neighbors would bring back from their travels because every one knew I was into rocks and rocks don't cost anything. I got into collecting Mazon Creek when my friend's son became interested in fossils and my friend told his son "Ask uncle Mark, he knows all about rocks and fossils". So I did the research and took the young man collecting in the creek itself and we found a bunch. They were all open concretions in the part of the creek we searched and badly eroded/worn but the kid hauled out half of a 5-gallon bucket of fossils. Ear-to-ear smile that probably lasted a week. And me too. And then I just kept going back and finding more and other sites to find them.

[Joe_17]

13 hours ago, Mark Kmiecik said:

I asked. Back in the 70's things were just a bit more laid back than they are now. I was in there quite a lot in '71 at the Field Museum, checking out the fossils that were display in the hall. About 8 or 9 times in one month and was noticed by one of the palaeontological assistants who said hi (on weekdays I had the whole place pretty much to myself) and I said something stupid like "Is this all there is?" and he said "No there's a lot more" and I said "Where is it?" and I was led downstairs to where heaven lies. That was at the Field in Chicago. I was going to the University of Illinois at Chicago Circle at the time studying Chemistry and that probably helped that I had a student ID which I showed. It was quite easy. I suppose nowadays you need FBI clearance or something on that order. Illinois State Museum I visited in '87 as I was researching Mazon Creek as I began my collecting. I called ahead of time, spoke with the curator of collections on the phone, explained why I would like to see the Mazon Creek specimen collection, and made arrangements for a date that was convenient for them. At that point I was well past being a student. I just sort of "shmoozed" my way in. At the Field I was escorted and attended by staff almost the entire time and viewed all the fossils, not only Mazon. I gave up after four days and about 1/3 the collection including Mazon specimens, but that was before I got into collecting Mazon Creek. I had a collection of fossils I had found as a kid and a teenager and a huge collection of rocks and minerals from all over the country that family, friends and neighbors would bring back from their travels because every one knew I was into rocks and rocks don't cost anything. I got into collecting Mazon Creek when my friend's son became interested in fossils and my friend told his son "Ask uncle Mark, he knows all about rocks and fossils". So I did the research and took the young man collecting in the creek itself and we found a bunch. They were all open concretions in the part of the creek we searched and badly eroded/worn but the kid hauled out half of a 5-gallon bucket of fossils. Ear-to-ear smile that probably lasted a week. And me too. And then I just kept going back and finding more and other sites to find them.

Wow that's awesome! I work there as a volunteer in the insect division. Hmmmmmm, i need to find out who to ask to see most of it . I'll definitely take pics if i can .

[Mark Kmiecik]

@Joe_17 You might try Emily Graslie. She's the "Chief Curiosity Correspondent" at the Field Museum, and has incredible leeway as far as access to collections goes. She does public awareness for the museum by creating videos on "The Brain Scoop" that feature various elements of what the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago and museums in general are all about. Try to talk her into doing one on the Mazon Creek biotas and the importance of saving this collection area from indiscriminate development before the fossil specimens can be removed. Once there's buildings on the collecting site it's gone, and bulldozers and other heavy equipment don't exactly help with preservation. I've already hinted that she might want to do this, and hearing it from someone who is "in-house" might just be the ticket. Back in the day we had Gene Richardson (curator, paleo, Mazon) as a liaison to amateur collectors. A tribute to his work at the Field in conjunction with Mazon Creek would make an awesome video. He's the reason the Field's Mazon collection is as great as it is. He had half the amateurs bringing him specimens for identification, and he convinced many, many of those collectors to donate their find(s) to the museum.

 

P.S. -- I only met him once at NEIU. He was a guest speaker. I don't recall what the event was, he discussed and identified fossils afterwards. I believe it may have been an ESCONI show.

[stats]

On 4/13/2019 at 10:24 AM, Joe_17 said:

Wow that's awesome! I work there as a volunteer in the insect division. Hmmmmmm, i need to find out who to ask to see most of it . I'll definitely take pics if i can .

Paul Mayer is the Collections Manager of Fossil Invertebrates and Az Klymiuk is the Collections Manager for Paleobotany.  Paul has done a presentation for an ESCONI General Meeting in the past and Az is doing a presentation at the September 2019 General Meeting.  Come on out and meet her.  She's very nice.  My daughter works for her as a intern/volunteer in Paleobotany.

 

Cheers,

Rich