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Last week in a thread by @WyomingRocks! about Whiskey Bridge, a Middle Eocene Claiborne Group site in Texas, @historianmichael asked about ostracods from there. I said I would post some pictures, so here I go. I brought home a bunch of matrix from the site a couple years ago and have broken much of it down and pulled out the larger fossils, but I had not really gone through the micro stuff until recently. I sieved it through a series of screens and found the ostracods primarily on the 60 mesh screen. I have only gone through a tiny amount of it, but wanted to answer his question as I tend to wander off in all fossil directions and who knows when I'll get back to Eocene Ostracods - haha. I picked over two dozen specimens from several different species out of less than 1/2 TBSP of matrix. I wonder what all is in the quart bag of it that I have!! Artusy in his thesis (see below) recognized 46 species of ostracods, I have a long way to go. A few years ago @jkfoamposted an ostracod or two from this location in this thread: http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/11079-the-arthropod-that-cant-get-any-respect/page/2/ There may be other posts on the forum as well, but Eocene ostracod threads are not a huge topic! I am not an ostracod expert by any stretch, so others that are more knowledgeable (like @Acryzona) can feel free to correct or update any of my ID's. The literature that I found dealing with ostracods from this site is limited and somewhat old, but that is what I have. I'm sure there are more recent publications on portions of the fauna, but I have not tried to wade through that. I primarily used: The Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology Part Q (1961), a thesis by Raymond Artusy (1960) Ostracoda of the Stone City Beds at Stone City Bluff, Texas, Bulletin 114 of the Mississippi Geological Survey by William Moore (1970) The Jackson Eocene Ostracoda of Mississippi I know some of the pictures are not totally focused, but unfortunately at this magnification, there is a pretty limited depth range that is in focus until I learn how to do photo stacking. I hope you can get the idea of what they look like though, some of them are really intricate and wonderful looking. The last few pictures are really intricate specimens and I'm sure with some effort, I could get a more precise ID, but the differences are all in the details of the ornamentation and subtle shape differences and I haven't taken the time yet to master that. Enjoy!

I was able to take another trip to the Leighton Formation today! It's been a while since I've been able to visit (months and months), but I've finally been able to. Unfortunately, during the winter the place is completely covered in snow and ice. Not really the best collecting conditions... My last trip there was in August of last year, and the spring has been very busy. Today it was time. It was supposed to be overcast with a chance of rain, but it came out sunny and bright. Absolutely beautiful day out. The collecting was very good. I unfortunately forgot to take a picture of the site. I was working in the same spot as last time, and at another outcrop a little farther down the shoreline. Place hasn't changed much, still as minuscule and weathered as ever. I had a better idea where to look though. Last time, I collected a lot, but I was mainly working in layers where the fossils were very evident. These layers contained a plethora of brachiopods, ostracods, tentaculites and other invertebrates - plus my first conodont. This time, though, I was going to try something a little different. The layers between the extremely fossiliferous layers had finer sediments, and generally seemed to keep the specimens intact better. I chose to mainly work in what I now call the "Chonetes layer". It's the only layer in these outcrops that contain Chonetes bastini brachiopods. The layer doesn't shatter as much as the other shale, so the pieces come out without a lot of cracking. It was also the same place that I found a nice trilo-bit, and I was hoping it would pay off. It did... The best finds of the day went to the trilobite cephalons. I found two Acaste cf. zerinae sp. - mostly intact, but an eye cracked off on the first, and both on the second. I was (luckily) able to find them, and I intend to glue them back on. At least the external molds are completely intact. In all of the following pictures, internal molds come first, external molds second. Cephalon #1, the one-eyed wonder. Cephalon #2 - missing both of the eyes. Sad, it would have been so nice too... Then came the pygidia - four of them! I believe that they are all the same species as the cephalons - A. zerinae - but I could be wrong. I'm sure the trilo-experts here can help me with that. Pygidium #1, the nicest one. Pygidium #2 - this little guy got a bit beat up when the rock split. Pygidium #3 - little bugger needs to be prepped a bit. Pygidium #4 - the internal mold of this cracked in half - and it's missing a piece. This one's a neat little trace fossil. It looks like an infilled burrow to me, but I'll set up a separate thread for that - with better pictures. And this very odd little guy. Another one I'll have to take better pictures on, and as soon as the matrix is pared down a bit I will scrutinize it under a microscope. It's not very evident, but it feathers out at the right end. It could be mineral staining or something, but I'm not sure yet. Then the stuff I couldn't bear to leave behind. I was trying to keep my collecting to new stuff, but some of them just sneaked in there... I feel like we've all experienced this before. Orbiculoidea sp. brachiopod. Lingula sp. brachiopod. Leiopteria rubra bivalve. It was a pretty good day. On top of these finds, I brought back some promising shale pieces to look for micro-fossils in - and a few more interesting unknowns. But that's for another time.. Thanks for reading!

Hello everyone, Recently @Shamalama showed me great kindness and generosity when he sent me some samples of matrix from three Devonian sites. This package arrived yesterday and I have slowly been picking out all of the tiny fossils. I want to use this topic to show off my finds. Here is everything I received:

Hi, a few days ago I went on my first ever fossil hunting trip to Eben-Emael, a Limestone quarry in Belgium that dates to the Maastrichtian and is part from the type location (the historical ENCI quarry being only a 3,5 km to the north. The trip was orginized by the BVP (Belgische Vereniging voor Paleontologie) and a short report of the trip with phot's and some of the finds can be found in this topic by @Manticocerasman who I was lucky enough to tag along with, cause I doubt I would have found many mention worthy fossils without the guidance of Kevin. But since I am into microfossils I decided to collect some samples of the limestone without the obvious fossils home to later be able to look for microfossils as it should be quite rich. I think I have around 1 - 3 kg of matrix left to look for microfossils. But I have never myself dissolved matrix, and although it seems easy, I don't want to make any mistakes. During the trip they advised me on two different approaches, depending on what kind of fossils I wanted to find. One approach was dissolving in water and the other in vinegar, but now the seeming obvious question. How exactly do I do that? Should I just take a bucket of a glass, fill it halfway with said liquids and just wait? Or should I use a sieve and lay the block there so only fossils remain in the sieve and the rest goes to the buttom. Does the limestone just dissolve or does some kind of putty residu where the microfossils will be in? If so, how to properly remove the fossils when you pour out the liquids without pouring out the fossils? I know I have many questions and some might be very obvious and straigh-forward, but I really haven't done this before and I would like to do it the right way from start. So thanks in advance for any tips & tricks, I would really appreciate any help!

Hello all, I have recently acquired more fossilised Ostracods from here in Connecticut. All of them are very different from each other and some come in plates as hash while others are more scattered but also whole. The plates range in sizes but the ostracods are pretty much the same everywhere. Some plates also have clam shrimp. These do not seem like particularly rare pieces although I have not seen any others from the Jurassic of CT. In return I am mostly looking for any Paleozoic material but I am open to any suggestions. Thank you everyone, More pictures will follow in the comments.

Here I have a few hash plates littered with ostracods all over their surfaces, they don't show up great on camera but I will also include a closeup shot of the surface. They were all found by me here in the Jurassic shales of Connecticut. I have way too many to keep even from just one batch of matrix but feel bad throwing them away. I am not looking for anything in particular just seeing if people would be interested, Thank you all, Misha.