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Hunting North Dakota's Hell Creek- 7/24-26


PaleoNoel

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Hi everyone, I missed the updates for the last three days so here they are. 

I spent the last 3 days of the week fossil hunting the Hell Creek badlands of North Dakota- In those 3 days I found some of the best fossils in my collection so far.

Wednesday was somewhat overcast which kept the exposures from being too hot. I spent the morning working a microsite with a few other people. My best finds here included a nice quality croc tooth, a likely bird bone and a bowfin jaw. Unfortunately the finds started to fizzle out after about an hour. The rest of the day was spent prospecting a wide open area which provided very little for fossil finds, the best being a croc vert. 

Here are the pics from Wednesday-

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Bowfin jaw section

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Croc tooth

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Likely a toe or limb bone

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A view of the microsite

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A croc vert

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A view of the area we prospected

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A rattlesnake in a burrow which I spotted at just the right time. I was moving closer to look at a large shed snake skin and saw this guy in a hole underneath the grass, he didn't rattle at me either which makes this a lucky encounter. (I didn't this close with my camera, I only zoomed in with it).

 

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Thursday turned out to be one of the best days I've ever spent fossil collecting, once again it was spent at a microsite, but this area was much larger than the previous day and far more productive. I spent the entire day here and found some incredible fossils that I'm happy to have in my collection.

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This perfect little dromaeosaurid tooth was my first great find of the day.

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Some variety of toe or limb bone

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A small Edmontosaurus tooth

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A view of this side of the microsite, around the bend was an even larger exposure. After spending the first part of the day on this side I went to the larger exposure.

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By this exposure I found a nice little Richardoestesia tooth on an anthill along with some other small finds including croc, gar and a mammal tooth. (the fossil below the tooth is some tiny bone, possibly a rib).

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A possible theropod or croc vert.

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A partial claw from a theropod

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A beautiful croc tooth and the biggest i've found so far in Cretaceous exposures.

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My best find of the day! A Cretaceous mammal jaw with a tooth still embedded in it.

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Some views of the larger microsite area that was so good to me.

 

 

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Friday was another good day for me, I started at another microsite where I began finding some nice fossils.

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My first good find of the day was the likely the tip of a Nanotyrannus tooth.

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Some variety of digit.

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A champsosaur tooth

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A beautiful Paronychodon tooth with the root still intact

 

In the second half of the day I went with a couple other people to a spot where one of them had found a beautiful black Nanotyrannus tooth sitting on the surface of a small hill. He told me he had found another that sat next to the first but when he picked up the first one, the dirt on the hillside crumbled and he couldn't find the second tooth after that. 

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Here's the hill or hump of exposure where he found the first tooth. After about 35 minutes of searching there was little trace of the second Nano tooth, so we gave up and checked out some of the exposures beyond that spot- This effort luckily turned out to be successful.

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Poking around the area for a few minutes, I turned over a piece of bone and it turned out to be this huge toe claw, either from thescelosaurus or pachycephalosaurus. I was pretty excited to find this awesome fossil and searched madly for the last half hour of the day for any associated pieces, of which I found only a few small bits that fit with the larger piece.

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In my mad search for any missing pieces I found this awesome premaxillary tooth, likely from Nanotyrannus.

 

I had an awesome experience on both the north and south dakota ranches this week- finding a total of 6 partial or complete claws, a number of theropod teeth, a croc jaw section, a mammal jaw section with a tooth intact, a ton of amber, a multitude of vertebrae from fish, crocs, champsosaurs, theropods and birds, and plenty of interesting digits and limb bones from small animals. A productive week would be an understatement!

I hope you enjoy reading and viewing my updates, stay tuned and wish me luck for my week in the Judith River formation in Montana.

 

 

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10 hours ago, PaleoNoel said:

enjoy reading and viewing my updates, stay tuned and wish me luck for my week in the Judith River formation in Montana.

Oh man oh man .... not anything in my wheelhouse of expertise but definitely on my bucket list. This has been one of the best threads. 

 

Thank you and good luck !

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Great finds! I have been putting some thought into taking my family on one of these excursions. I think my boys would really love it.

Dipleurawhisperer5.jpg

I like Trilo-butts and I cannot lie.

 

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Thanks. I enjoyed the ride.

 

 

Mark.

 

Fossil hunting is easy -- they don't run away when you shoot at them!

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13 hours ago, Troodon said:

Looks like ND has been good to you.  Nice photos...

Absolutely, this has been one of my best weeks fossil hunting.

8 hours ago, Brett Breakin' Rocks said:

Oh man oh man .... not anything in my wheelhouse of expertise but definitely on my bucket list. This has been one of the best threads. 

Thank you and good luck !

 

8 hours ago, digit said:

Very cool! Thanks for taking us along on the hunt.

Cheers.

-Ken

 

 

1 hour ago, deutscheben said:

Whoah, what a bunch of great finds! Thanks for sharing. 

 

1 hour ago, Mark Kmiecik said:

Thanks. I enjoyed the ride.

Thanks everyone! 

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7 hours ago, Darktooth said:

Great finds! I have been putting some thought into taking my family on one of these excursions. I think my boys would really love it.

You absolutely should, I highly recommend it! Spots for paleoprospectors next summer are quickly being taken up so if you want to sign up you should do that soon, additionally there is a $250 discount per person per week if you sign up by August.

Their website is https://www.paleoprospectors.com/

Hope to see you out there!

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32 minutes ago, PaleoNoel said:

You absolutely should, I highly recommend it! Spots for paleoprospectors next summer are quickly being taken up so if you want to sign up you should do that soon, additionally there is a $250 discount per person per week if you sign up by August.

Their website is https://www.paleoprospectors.com/

Hope to see you out there!

Thanks for the info!

Dipleurawhisperer5.jpg

I like Trilo-butts and I cannot lie.

 

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