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Help Identifying possible organisms from nodules of Pit 11, Mazon Creek Part 2
Joseph Fossil posted a topic in Fossil ID
Starting in early 2021, I've been going fossil hunting at the Mazon Creek area in Grundy County, Illinois. The site I visit the most so far is the fairly large Mazonia-Braidwood State Fish and Wildlife Area. After advice from other members of the Fossilfourm, I've decided to put the nodules I'm most curious about under the microscope and dissecting scope! With these better photographs, I'm wondering if anyone could give a proper ID for these specimens?
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Help identifying possible organisms from nodules of Pit 11, Mazon Creek
Joseph Fossil posted a topic in Fossil ID
Starting in 2021, I've been going fossil hunting around the Mazon Creek area in Grundy County, Illinois. The site I visit the most so far is the fairly large Mazonia-Braidwood State Fish and Wildlife Area and at first, I would barley find anything. Then after visiting Monster Lake and another secret location in the area, I started finding more fossils. However, most are around 2-7 cm. In length and I'm still having difficulty getting IDs for them? Would anyone be able to help ID them? I think this could be some sort of Chondrichthyan or a lobe finned fish? Maybe part of a dragonfly wing or a plant? Plant fossil - Genera unknown currently? I don't know what this could be? The specimen here looks almost like a plant fossil. Worm fossil - genera unknown currently.
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Part 2 Fossil hunting trip in Utica, Illinois October/29/2022
Joseph Fossil posted a topic in Fossil Hunting Trips
This is the second part of my post describing my recent fossil hunting trip with @Tales From the Shale in Utica, of which it was awesome!!! So after visiting the abandoned clay pit, we decided to go to another location in Utica one might not expect to be productive - the former peabody coal company Pit 15 (or at least its outskirts), located not to far away from Lake Shannon, Kankakee County, Illinois (I'm am not going to tell the specific route or address so the area doesn't end up being picked clean). We went there as I had heard a report that a while ago, someone found a sizable Cladodus (or cladodont labeled as Cladodus) tooth at Pit 15 itself. At the top of the outskirts of the Pit was truly Beautiful!!! I expected to find simply nodules in the area. What I found instead were a staggering amount of different rocks with a descent portion containing fossils, most of brachipods though. As the area was once a mine, I've somewhat come up with a theory as to why this is - when the mines were closed, the pit was filled not just with nodule containing rocks but by all the types of rocks available in the Utica area ranging from shale to clay to limestone, likely either Ordovician or Carboniferous in age. It's still a pretty productive site and I've recently analyzed many of the specimens with a microscope and dissecting scope and I hope to get some IDs from them! Here's a possible shark spine I found there!
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I had this Mazon Creek concretion open today. It was collected from the Braidwood biota (freshwater/terrestrial). My best guess is a partial millipede (Amynilyspes?) but I'm not sure and wanted to get other opinions. Thanks for any help. @Nimravis @deutscheben @bigred97 @RCFossils @stats @flipper559 @Mark Kmiecik
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The Fossils of the Essex Quad in Kankakee/Grundy County Illinois
Joseph Fossil posted a topic in Fossil Hunting Trips
I've been recently trying to find some good places to go fossil hunting in the Mazon Creek area and there is one area some say is good but I've never heard or or been to before. It's called the Essex Quadrangle or Essex Quad in Kankakee County Illinois. It's supposed to be extremely close to the old Peabody coal company pit 15 and have fossils from the Essex Biota dating to around the Pennsylvanian period. https://isgs.illinois.edu/maps-data-pub/quads/e/essex.shtml https://ilmineswiki.web.illinois.edu/index.php/0359 I'm wondering if anyone's heard of or been to the place before, what kind of fossils you can find there, and where is it? -
Saturday, October 15th, 2022 was the ESCONI Mazon Creek Open House. It was a great day with about 100 visitors to enjoy a event devoted to Mazon Creek fossils. There were numerous forum members in attendance.@connorp @bigred97 @flipper559 @fiddlehead @RCFossils @Roby @Hurtlady @jdp to name a few. For a full report with videos of 3 of the 4 presentations, please visit the ESCONI website. The fourth video will be posted after the research is published. Recently, we've had a few historical posts about the Mazon Creek Open House events in the past, Mazon Monday #133 and Throwback Thursday #132. @Nimravis supplied me with quite a bit of the historical material. Thanks, Ralph! Paul Mayer and Jack Wittry were on hand from the Field Museum. They provided two display cases of fossils, including the holotypes of Essexcella asherae and Lascoa mesostaurara. Random photos from the day. And, more fossils!
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Hi all Just a quick question , I have been very interested in the material from Mazon Creek since I won a great auction lot from Ralph that included a few fine specimens . While looking today online I spotted a trilobite pygidium that was labelled Mazon Creek it looks like the right type of siderite concretions but it could be from some where else . So what do we think? I don’t think they was native to Mazon creek but maybe transported there by floods ?
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2022-09-17 ESCONI Field Trip to a Spoil Pile Near Danville, IL
stats posted a topic in Fossil Hunting Trips
On September 17th, 2022, ESCONI held a field trip to a coal mine spoil pile near Danville, IL. It was a fairly hot day with temperatures in the upper 80's. However, it was a productive field trip. There had been quite a bit of work on the hill this summer and it was looking quite different from the spring. The road to the top went around from the left instead of the right. There weren't as many exposed fossils in "Red Dog" found this time, but concretions were readily available for collecting. There were a few Forum members present. @deutscheben @connorp I'm sure I'm forgetting a few, please announce yourself! Here are some photos of the trip. Some of the photos were taken with a drone. I need to take some more photos of fossils, so stay tuned... I'll post concretions if/when they open. There was a bunch of poison ivy all around outside of the hill. Mushrooms were plentiful. And, of course fossils!
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Not really sure what to make of this one and hoping someone can help ID. Thanks in advance. Pit 4 area
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Today was the late Summer ESCONI Braceville Shaftmine collecting trip. Well it was the first day, tomorrow will be the second day of the outing. Today’s trip ran from 9 am - 3 pm. I arrived early and unpacked my car. I try to bring a number of fossils that are dumped out for the participants to go through around noon time. Today I brought a potpourri of fossils that included a bunch of opened Mazon Creek fossils, Pleistocene/Pliocene shells from Florida, Oligocene mammal fossils from South Dakota, Cretaceous Pierre Shale ammonite / bivalves from South Dakota, Mississippian fossils from Vienna, Illinois, Pennsylvanian brachiopods from Oglesby, Illinois, Ordovician fossils from Southern Indiana and Kentucky, Shark teeth and mammoth ivory pieces from Florida, petrified wood from Arizona, cephalopods from Graf, Iowa, Carboniferous fossils from Catlin, Illinois and other fossils. I believe that there were between 40-50 participants. I only stayed around until 10 am, due to prior commitments, but I wanted to bring fossils to dump. There were several Forum members present, including @stats , @deutscheben , @connorp and others, hopefully Rich can add them. Prior to the start collecting , row call and rules are gone over. After that is taken care of most participants walk the 1/4 mile to the Shaftmine spoil pile, while others hang around and learn about fossil collecting at the site and what to look for. There are also Jack’s @fiddlehead books available for purchase. Then it is off to the collecting site for the others. Here are various pictures of the collectors doing their thing. More pictures to follow-
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I came across this piece tonight and am looking to see what others think. This piece has what appears to be a faint gut line and 2- eyes. I was thinking possible Hagfish, but not convinced. @RCFossils @stats @Mark Kmiecik @connorp @deutscheben
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Esconichthys with potential soft tissue donated to field museum
TheRocksWillShoutHisGlory posted a topic in Partners in Paleontology - Member Contributions to Science
I donated the below specimen to the Field Museum of Natural History. It is identified as an Esconichthys apopyris. Work is being done on redefining/solidifying the categorization of this species, and a professional helped facilitate my donation to the museum. There are details on this specimen such as a yolk sac and I look forward to hearing if there are internal details such as vascular structures. I feel like I can see them but I am excited to open it up to professional analysis through donation to a research institution..thumb.jpg.8dc003a0ff06756e8f9e168ce661ff19.jpg)
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Today it was early and about 60 degrees and I decided to go out and do a little collecting. Here are pics of the concretions and some as I found them. As I saw it- As I saw it- As I saw it- As I saw these two- The next piece was large and flat. I do not bring these home, I try to open them in the field or I that is an issue, I break it in half and see if there is anything in the middle. That is rarely the case with these and that was the case today. It is a lot easier this way, saves on the weight that you have to carry. This next one will most likely have a Cyperites. Two more next to each other. As I saw it-
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This is an odd one for me, anyone have any ideas?
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This evening I had a little bit of time to do some collecting. It was not my best day, but it was still enjoyable. Here is a large Annularia, I was tapping the “crust / outer shell” off of the concretion, and it split open. Also found a nice Lepidostrobophyllum majus. And I am thinking that this is Sigilaria. Here are some concretions as they were found. Sometimes you find concretions near other collectors footprints, as below. I have found concretions next to my footprints, not knowing I missed a piece unti I circled back. Time of day, lighting, etc. are the main causes. Here are my concretions for the day, about 45 of them. I love fossil trackways and found these possible future fossils. The sunset on the drive home.
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I just came across this piece that was found at Pit 11. I am leaning towards a weird preservation for a Octomedusa pieckorum, but it reminds me of something else that I cannot put my finger on, non Mazon Creek related. What do you think? @RCFossils @stats @Mark Kmiecik @connorp @deutscheben And any other Forum members.
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I decided to do a little collecting again this evening, not that I need any more concretions, but I hear them calling to me. Below is a picture of the concretions that I found this evening. I like big concretions, as most people do, but most do not contain anything, so I leave them alone, like I did to the one below. My favorite concretions to find are the smaller ones, like the ones below. The one pictured below is a nice shape, but not perfect. This larger, flat one is promising, but will most likely be a dud. This next piece was showing both ends, at first I thought that it was two different concretions, until I popped it out. Here are a couple pieces that were found opened. Here is one that I whacked open, I will have to look at it later to see what is included. I was not going to take it, because the shape was not the best. A nice view as I was getting on the highway.
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Looking for a little help on this piece- Flora, Fauna, nothing? I have not seen anything like this before, it was found at Pit 11.
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This will be my shortest post ever. I had some time after work to drive the 45 minutes to a site to collect some Mazon Creek concretions. I did not spend much time collecting and only found about 30 concretions, many that I cracked open for a police officer who had asked me how the collecting was going. He was interested and will give the fossils to his kids. Here are a couple pics of open concretions that were in the ground and how they looked after I got them home. Neuropteris ovata- You can see the split open concretion in the ground. Here is an Alethopteris Macroneuropteris Cyperites- Bark-
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@connorp @fiddlehead @stats @deutscheben @Mark Kmiecik @RCFossils What do you think? I was thinking that it is possibly an example of Rhacophyllum spinosum, but only about a 51% chance.
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I did a little collecting today, found a lot of nice concretions, below are some “in-situ” pictures of concretions and a few pics of some of the open stuff that I found- all Flora. Most of the concretions and the fossils that will be included, will be posted in my “Sometimes you have to whack it“ post. Hopefully this contains a beautiful fern. m
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From the album: Mark's Mazon Creek Fossils
BOTH HALVES SIDERITE CONCRETION, SEPARATED BY FREEZE/THAW METHOD & LIGHT HAMMER BLOW. SPECIMEN 37mm X 30mm (1-7/16" x 1-3/16"). MILD SULFURIC ACID BATH APPLIED. -
From the album: Mark's Mazon Creek Fossils
BOTH HALVES SIDERITE CONCRETION, SEPARATED BY FREEZE/THAW METHOD & LIGHT HAMMER BLOW. SPECIMEN 70mm X 25mm (2-3/4" x 1"). FRAGMENT OF EACH HALF GLUED BACK INTO POSITION. -
From the album: Mark's Mazon Creek Fossils
CONVEX HALF SIDERITE CONCRETION, FOUND AS-IS. SPECIMEN 63mm X 21mm (2-7/16" x 13/16"). -
From the album: Mark's Mazon Creek Fossils
BOTH HALVES SIDERITE CONCRETION, SPLIT BY FREEZE/THAW METHOD & LIGHT HAMMER BLOW. SPECIMEN 80mm X 27mm (3-3/16" x 1-1/16"). BOTH HALVES GLUED.
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