Small creek hunt In place of the Peace River

[dalmayshun]

My regular fossil hunting friend and I decided to hunt one of our small creeks since the Peace is still just a bit high. Last time we went to this site, it was so low and slow, that leaf debris had covered our nice gravel bars and made it all but impossible to look. We decided then, there was an optimum range between too high and too low and were hoping to hit it just right. It is about a mile walk in, thorugh 5 foot high burr bearing plants. Luckily this time, the seeds weren't quite ripe, so I didn't come out of the woods looking like I was dressed up for Holloween, as the Burr Man Monster. The walk was pleasant, although we are still hitting record breaking temperatures in the 90's this time of October....good thing I am heading to the Smoky's to camp this week...We passed several terrestrial orchids on the way in, not quite blooming, so we knew we were a bit earlier than the last time...and as we climbed down the ridge to our "spot"  we were delighted to be able to see the gravel bottom. No debris. Hooray. We got right to work, screening, and relaxing.  The stream is only about 10 feet wide, where we were, and a pleasant 18" deep. moving along at a speed swift enough to cleaer the water immediately after digging. Even if I were to never find anything at this spot...I still might come to do it. It is so very pleasant. And I always find a few interesting things. In the photo, I have attached, I added my favorites in the top row. The biggest gator tooth I have ever found, perfect and a little over an inch long. A nice glyptodont piece, a puffer fish mouth plate, an interesting ray plate, a really neat piece of limestone, a great white shark tooth and a net weight.. The other teeth are all just ordinary, but fun to find. Often a screen here, has 4 to f teeth in it. My friend found a great white, 2 times the size of mine. I should have photographed it, a beautiful 4 inch long antler piece, including its base, and a gorgeous piece of soft shelled turtle. Both he and i like to find turtle shell, I have a nice little edge piece in the second row. We stayed about 3 hours. didn't find any megs this time, as we have before, but we both had a great time....as we wait for our  favorite sites on the Peace river to become accessible. 

[PaleoNoel]

Nice finds, congrats on that gator tooth and glyptodont osteoderm.

[facehugger]

16 minutes ago, PaleoNoel said:

Nice finds, congrats on that gator tooth and glyptodont osteoderm.

Great haul!

 

Houstonian here. I get a Winter Recess for my job in higher-ed, and I 100% plan to partake in some Florida fossil goodness this winter...

[Shellseeker]

30 minutes ago, dalmayshun said:

Even if I were to never find anything at this spot...I still might come to do it. It is so very pleasant. And I always find a few interesting things. In the photo, I have attached, I added my favorites in the top row. The biggest gator tooth I have ever found, perfect and a little over an inch long. A nice glyptodont piece, a puffer fish mouth plate, an interesting ray plate, a really neat piece of limestone, a great white shark tooth and a net weight..

 

Yes, exactly.  Even when conditions are not the best, you find some great stuff..  I see some tillybones just under the 4 inch mark.  How about a blowup photo of just the GW.. I have loved the smaller ones eveyr since I found this little one years back in a peace river tributary creek.

 

Congratulations on a great day in the sunshine!!!

[Gizmo]

Very nice finds, congrats! 

[Fossildude19]

Glad you were able to get out and do some hunting. 

Looks like you had a good day!

Thanks for posting this.

 

[Nimravis]

Great trip report and some really cool finds. I have to try to get out to the Peace River next time I visit Sanibel. Thanks for posting.

[garyc]

Nice finds!

[PODIGGER]

Thanks for the report, nice finds!  Haven't been out to the river in over a week because of the last big storm.  I need to find a nice smaller creek to keep busy!

[dalmayshun]

Here is a closeup of the Great White tooth for Shellseeker...these teeth amaze me, they are like saws...no wonder the Great White Shark continues to be such a formidible predator. And yes, I found two types of tilly bones, those long oval ones, and the other with the offset bluge. Some of the pieces directly below that are horse teeth pieces, and a couple pieces of mammoth or mastodon ivory. I always enjoy finding those, though a whole tooth would be really nice. Incidentally, this is the same place I found a section of Saber Tooth Tiger incisor last year...when I went this year, I kept hoping to pull of a matching section of the second half of the tooth....needle in a haystack look. LOL

 

 

[Shellseeker]

Thanks for the photo of your GW.  I am fascinated by the serrations of these 1 inch versions.

 

On 10/30/2019 at 9:25 AM, dalmayshun said:

Incidentally, this is the same place I found a section of Saber Tooth Tiger incisor last year...when I went this year, I kept hoping to pull of a matching section of the second half of the tooth....needle in a haystack look. LOL

 

Now, that's an attention grabber !!!!  ANY Sabre cat material is rarer than rare.

[grandpa]

21 minutes ago, Shellseeker said:

ANY Sabre cat material is rarer than rare.

I agree, but I don't understand why that would be the case.  Were there so few STC's around?  Was there some reason why their remains would be less likely to be preserved in the fossil record?  Does anyone know why, assuming the premise is correct? 

[Bone Daddy]

24 minutes ago, grandpa said:

I agree, but I don't understand why that would be the case.  Were there so few STC's around?  Was there some reason why their remains would be less likely to be preserved in the fossil record?  Does anyone know why, assuming the premise is correct? 

 

This is a good question.

 

[Bone Daddy]

On 10/29/2019 at 1:46 PM, dalmayshun said:

My regular fossil hunting friend and I decided to hunt one of our small creeks since the Peace is still just a bit high. Last time we went to this site, it was so low and slow, that leaf debris had covered our nice gravel bars and made it all but impossible to look. We decided then, there was an optimum range between too high and too low and were hoping to hit it just right. It is about a mile walk in, thorugh 5 foot high burr bearing plants. Luckily this time, the seeds weren't quite ripe, so I didn't come out of the woods looking like I was dressed up for Holloween, as the Burr Man Monster. The walk was pleasant, although we are still hitting record breaking temperatures in the 90's this time of October....good thing I am heading to the Smoky's to camp this week...We passed several terrestrial orchids on the way in, not quite blooming, so we knew we were a bit earlier than the last time...and as we climbed down the ridge to our "spot"  we were delighted to be able to see the gravel bottom. No debris. Hooray. We got right to work, screening, and relaxing.  The stream is only about 10 feet wide, where we were, and a pleasant 18" deep. moving along at a speed swift enough to cleaer the water immediately after digging. Even if I were to never find anything at this spot...I still might come to do it. It is so very pleasant. And I always find a few interesting things. In the photo, I have attached, I added my favorites in the top row. The biggest gator tooth I have ever found, perfect and a little over an inch long. A nice glyptodont piece, a puffer fish mouth plate, an interesting ray plate, a really neat piece of limestone, a great white shark tooth and a net weight.. The other teeth are all just ordinary, but fun to find. Often a screen here, has 4 to f teeth in it. My friend found a great white, 2 times the size of mine. I should have photographed it, a beautiful 4 inch long antler piece, including its base, and a gorgeous piece of soft shelled turtle. Both he and i like to find turtle shell, I have a nice little edge piece in the second row. We stayed about 3 hours. didn't find any megs this time, as we have before, but we both had a great time....as we wait for our  favorite sites on the Peace river to become accessible. 

 

Nice reports and finds. I am jealous. I don't have much luck with creeks. I've searched a few and come up dry mostly. I've found a few stray things, but nothing to write home about. That is true for the unnamed creeks I have scouted. I did find some decent stuff in Charlie Creek once, but a lot of people go there, so it's hardly a secret or "out of the way".

 

 

[Shellseeker]

On 10/31/2019 at 10:59 AM, grandpa said:

I agree, but I don't understand why that would be the case.  Were there so few STC's around?  Was there some reason why their remains would be less likely to be preserved in the fossil record?  Does anyone know why, assuming the premise is correct? 

 My original thought was AGE of the fossil... I do not find much Rhino, Gomph, pronghorn, Eremotherium, etc material, even though there were LOTS of them. Fossils can be destroyed over time.

Next, I am not digging in the correct stratums,   99% plus of what I find in Pleistocene... In Florida , I need someone or something to did DEEP holes for me.  ..

But then this from Richard Hulbert, exhibit, located in the Pleistocene Epoch wall case.

Quote

 

 

Story

 

Gracile Saber-toothed Cat Skull by Richard Hulbert 00:00 / 00:36

Most people don’t realize that there was more than one type of saber-toothed cat. In fact, in Florida we have about a half a dozen different species. In the Pleistocene, the genus Smilodon includes two species: the large tiger-size Smilodon fatalis and the skull in the case, the Leopard- or Jaguar-size Smilodon gracilis. The world’s largest sample of Smilodon gracilis comes from near Tampa at the famous Leisey shell pit.

Richard Hulbert
Collection Manager, Vertebrate Paleontology
Florida Museum of Natural History

[Bone Daddy]

I'd have a heart-attack if I found a skull like that.

 

[Shellseeker]

I keep on trying to consider WHY these are so rare, given that these are relatively recent fossils:

A source Feranec, Robert, 2005/12/31
T1  - GROWTH RATE AND DURATION OF GROWTH IN THE ADULT CANINE OF SMILODON GRACILIS, AND INFERENCES ON DIET THROUGH STABLE ISOTOPE ANALYSIS, VL  - 45
Bulletin of the Florida Museum of Natural History

and a drawing:

 

In general, no one will be finding complete skulls.. At best you pick up an incisor,  a carnassial both of which can be identified as from smaller cats. Think about finding a worn, or broken Smilodon Gracilis canine in the Peace River.  The total length complete is 80 mm, slightly over 3 inches. On your find, you are missing 30 mm of the tip. Large Jaguar canines are over 3 inches. 

 

The basic key to differentiating Jaguar from Gracilis is the lateral width of the Sabre... you might not even notice

 

[digit]

Top level predators will always be fewer in number than the lower trophic levels on which they feed. At the Montbrook site near Gainesville where I've volunteered for several years, very late Miocene fossils (~5.5 Ma) are found in abundance. It was likely a riverine site and so lots of turtles, gators, and fish bits but also some mammals like gomphotheres, peccaries, tapirs, horses, and some less common animals like deer, pronghorns, skunks, otters, and micro-fossils from a variety of rodents. There is always a bit of excitement when carnivore material is unearthed. This last visit a few weeks back I was lucky to see Richard Hulbert working to clear the area around a gomphothere skull when he found a mandible from what appeared to be a juvenile Borophagus (hyena dog) wedged between an alligator jaw and a bit of turtle shell. Quite literally tens of thousands of fossils have been collected at this site but a carnivore site still gets folks excited.

 

A few years back a volunteer found an ancestor to the more recent Smilodon saber-tooth cats. This species (Rhizosmilodon fiteae) was smaller (jaguar size) and the teeth had not yet evolved into the insanely long dentition of the well known Smilodon fatalis.

 

https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/montbrook/blog/saber-tooth-cat-skull-exclusive-1st-look/

 

https://twitter.com/floridamuseum/status/918223114332528640

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[FossilNerd]

Glad your mile long hike through the burs was worth it! Some neat finds there.