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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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Found this in St. Clair, Pennsylvania in slate quarry on private property. Each piece is 2.5 inches width by 9 inches length. I love it but don't know anything about it. Any help would be much appreciated. Thank you.
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I found this nice specimen while hunting for 'white fern' plates out in Centralia, PA. Based off of the size, shape and definition, I'm curious if its a seed of some sort? I left the seed un-prepped with the white silicate mix still present, would love help with an ID
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I'm brand new to Fossil Forum, and can't afford the big splashy wall display fossils, so my "collection" is modest, but it's a start. I have three of these fern plates from St. Clair, PA, and two diplomystus fish fossils from the Green River formation in Wyoming.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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St Clair Plant Fossil_ShalePlate_FrontView with Fossil ID
hitekmastr posted a gallery image in Member Collections
From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
This shale piece is 14 inches wide and 8.5 inches tall. It contains at least 3 species of fossil plant leaves as shown.© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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Trigonocarpus_Alethopteris_Attached_Right Half_St Clair PA_Michael and Nancy Tomczyk
hitekmastr posted a gallery image in Member Collections
From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
Cordaites were very large leaves that resembled corn leaves, with parallel grooves running the length of the leaf.© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
These fossils that look like blades of grass are actually similar to pine needles.© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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Eusphenopteris (3)_Llewellyn Formation_Pennsylvanian_St Clair PA_Pennsylvanian
hitekmastr posted a gallery image in Member Collections
From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
© Copyright (c) 2019 by Michael Tomczyk. All rights reserved.
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I have been trying to find a reasonable solution for preserving St. Clair fossils, which are mineralized in white, yellow and orange colors. Cleaning with water dissolves the colors. Coating with most types of glue will also remove the color, turning white fossils to black! I experimented this week with decoupage, which seems to preserve the white mineralized fossils without changing them, and gives the specimen a glossy sheen. I am interested in this because the colors of St. Clair fossils are fairly robust, but can flake off over time, and may suffer from oxidation. My reason for posting is to ask if anyone has good reasons to NOT use decoupage to preserve and seal St. Clair fossil specimens? Here is a photo one the first one I tried, which is a small fragment - note the glossy sheen, and also how the color and detail was preserved. Decoupage looks milky when applied but dries clear. I want to verify that this is a good approach before trying this on larger speciments, some of which are 1 to 2 feet in size.
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Hi fossil friends - I've been away from the board for a couple of years, settling into retirement, now getting back to some fossil fun. I'm sorting through my St. Clair inventory which is now pretty large since that was where my wife and I did most of our collecting when the site was still open. So now I have quite a few plant fossils and am organizing and prepping them - not sure what I'll do with them. These two items are the last fossils we collected from St. Clair before they closed the site - the large one is 25 inches long and was cut by someone (probably the idiots who ruined the site access). Most pieces are smaller and individual specimens. I'm organizing, labeling and putting in Riker mounts now. Interested in any suggestions how to proceed? I also have a collection of unique mangal shoots we collected at a secret site in central New York which are unique and probably somewhat rare.
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From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
This is another view of the same Trigonocarpus, this view showing the open end of the seed. Seeds of seed ferns - this was probably from Medullosa - had open ends to allow pollen to enter. It is thought they were fertilized by pollen when they dropped into the water although a few paleobiologists believe insects may have pollinated them through the opening. Also why were the seeds encased in a fruit like covering (like avocados)? To be consumed by creatures that lived in the shallow swamp water?-
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Trigonocarpus attached to Alethopteris frond.jpg
hitekmastr posted a gallery image in Member Collections
From the album: Carboniferous Plant Fossils in My Collection
This Trigonocarpus fossil from St. Clair is an exceedingly rare pairing that includes the compression (fossil) and impression (cast) in matching pieces. If you look very closely you can see there is a short stem connecting the seed to the Alethopteris stem. Finding these connected is VERY rare. Also, if you look closely you can see some sort of structure revealed in the very center of the seed.- 1 comment
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I'm compiling a list of plant fossils found at St. Clair. Does anyone have a starting point, or better yet a list of St. Clair fossil types? Thanks.
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WHAT WE LEARNED IN OUR FIRST FOSSIL HUNTING SUMMER This is a short recap of what we learned on our fossil trips this summer, in our first 3 months as very new fossil collectors. This week, Nancy and I gave a slide presentation on our summer fossil hunting experiences, to the Delaware Valley Paleontological Society. We didn't realize it ourselves but in 3 months we visited 8 sites in Pennsylvania and New York including: Antes Creek, Deer Lake, Red Hill, Juniata County, McIntyre Mountain, Montour and St. Clair in Pennsylvania, and a very productive trip to Tully, NY. We visited St. Clair 4 times, which has become our home site. At St. Clair, we were astonished by the diversity of species - we collected well articulated samples of more than a dozen species including: Alethopteris, Annularia, Asterophyllites, Cordaites, Cyclopteris, Eusphenopteris, Lepidophylloides, Neuropteris, Odontopteris, Pecopteris, Sphenophyllum, Sphenopteris, and numerous Seeds, Bark, Roots. Most notably - I learned to pronounce all of these without stuttering! At St. Clair, we spent one trip looking exclusively for seeds trigonocarpus), and one trip looking just for roots (stigmaria). Our most significant finds have included very large (2 foot long) display pieces covered with well articulated orange ferns, an alethopteris seed attached to a leaf stem, and many Carboniferous leaves that have different shapes from traditional ferns. What we learned this summer has really helped us find some interesting fossils - here are a few things we did that helped a lot: 1. DOING OUR HOMEWORK. It helped to study each site in advance using Internet websites and books on fossils (Dave's "Views of the Mahantango" and "Louisville Fossils" are among the best, imho). Several universities also have great educational sites that bring each era to life in very creative and interesting ways, with lots of illustrations and photos. I like the UC-Berkeleyand University of West Virginia websites. 2. LEARNING FROM TRIP REPORTS. We read trip reports from other groups and individuals to see what they reported - sometimes this helps us stumble across new places to visit such as the site at Tully, NY and Deer Lake. 3. SETTING GOALS AND TARGETS FOR EACH TRIP. For each trip, we establish specific goals - for example we may look for seeds, or roots at St. Clair, or trilobites or shell assemblages at a Devonian site. Our interest right now is in looking for things that are scarce or rare, and fossils that are extremely well articulated (which is also rare!). We also like solving puzzles so eventually we would like to find things that help add to the fossil record in areas where there are still questions or missing links. 4. DISPLAYING WHAT WE FIND. Personally, Nancy and I like collecting larger fossils that we can display in mounts and frames, and we are also looking for larger pieces that we can display like sculptures - we have a few pieces that we drilled holes in, inserted wooden dowels that we stained, and then drilled/inserted the dowels in wooden trophy bases - all available from a craft store. This allows us to display thicker fossils esp. assemblages, like sculptures, and you can turn them around and look at all sides when they are mounted like this. 5. WE AVOID FOSSIL HORDING. We both agreed that we would NOT become "fossil horders" putting hundreds of rocks in boxes and sticking them away in the basement or garage - instead, we focus on finding display-quality items, and rare or scarce finds which we are slowly putting in frames. 6. DOCUMENTING OUR FINDS WITH CLOSEUP PHOTOS. We photograph everything we find as soon as possible after returning from a trip, using a digital camera with a closeup attachment - many times we find new discoveries while taking closeup photos and some of our best finds came AFTER we returned from the trip and inspected our fossils. I usually put the finds on a white background on an ironing board and use window light, nothing fancy, but it works. 7. FOSSIL ID. We post anything we can't identify on the Fossil Forum and are EXTREMELY grateful for the terrific response from our friends on the site! We are also accumulating a growing library of fossil books (some modern, some from the 19th and early 20th century) so we can identify more fossils ourselves without having to post on Fossil ID. 8. WRITING ABOUT OUR EXPERIENCES GIVES US NEW INSIGHTS. We report everything that interests and excites us about fossil hunting on Fossil Forum to share our experiences - and we find that writing about what we're doing helps us learn more and gain insights, just from writing about it. We have also started videotaping some of our adventures and are thinking about the best place to post some of these. 9. WINTER PLANS: COPING WITH CABIN FEVER. Our winter plans are to visit one or two more sites, then go into "fossil hibernation" and organize, identify and label fossils we haven't processed yet. We have a Dremel to do some light preservation work where needed. We are not planning to become "chemical conservators" - using chemicals to dissolve limestone and so forth - that's a bit too ambitious for us at this point. We may get involved in some interesting activities by local universities that are using 3D printing to process and replicate large dinosaur bones. We are also planning to provide an exhibit (on Carboniferous plants and trees/coal swamps) at a fossil fair in April. 10. RECOMMENDED READING: I enjoy reading fossil books - I'm currently reading with great interest a small book entitled "Leaves and Stems from Fossil Forests" by Raymond E. Janssen (1939) which I bought last night at the DVPS meeting, and a textbook entitled Introduction to Paleobiology and the Fossil Record by Benton and Harper (2008) (excellent book). The book that has been the most useful to me so far is the classic book "Fossil Collecting in Pennsylvania" by Hoskins et. al. (3rd ed. 1983). I am constantly re-reading the Hoskins book and find something new each time as my knowledge grows. A book that impressed Nancy and me is a large beautifully illustrated book entitled "Prehistoric Life: The Definitive Visual History of Life on Earth" (published by Dorling Kindersley, 2012) UPDATE (Oct 11): Nancy is taking some college courses which are prerequisites to enter grad school, so I am doing most of the fossil reading and ID. I read several books at the same time and other books I purchased that I am currently reading are: Paleobotany: The Biology and Evolution of Fossil Plants (second edition) by Thomas Taylor; and Introduction to Paleobiology and the Fossil Record by Benton and Harper. I guess you can tell from this that I'm reading up on fossil plants - my main interest is not just to understand the evolution and fossil record, identification tips, etc. - but also to try to figure out where the missing links and gaps are so if we come across something that adds to the fossil record, we will be able to recognize the value. What is most surprising is that there is a lot missing from the Carboniferous record - partly because after this period, many of the oceans and swamps apparently dried up and there were ice ages and other factors that caused mass extinctions. Here are some interesting things I have learned this summer about Fossil Plants and Trees: 1. More Carboniferous insect fossils and evidence of insects are needed (by the way, there are some GREAT current discussions about insects on this forum!). 2. Many categories of lycopsids and other Carboniferous trees and plants do not have verified associations between the leaves and seeds, or leaves and trunks/stems. Many trigonocarpus (fossilized seeds and "fruits") are found with leaves, but examples of seeds actually ATTACHED to leaf sprigs are rare (we have found one example of a seed attached to Alethopteris). 3. More Leaf and Bark Verifications are Needed. Another interesting thing I learned is that there are more than 30 different types of "scale tree" patterns but only half a dozen leaves for these trees - suggesting that a lot of different species had the same leaves - or - there are a lot of missing leaf types or the existing leaf types have not been matched to the bark patterns yet. 4. Another peculiar revelation is that most Carboniferous leaves that do not fall neatly into classic fern shapes seem to be lumped together as "sphenopteris" - we have many "non-traditional fern" leaf fossils that are VERY different from each other and obviously different species, but when we go online to ID them, they all seem to be grouped as "sphenopteris!" Maybe some of these leaf types match up with the bark patterns I mentioned. 5. Last but certainly not least is the insight that fern trees could have 2 or 3 different types of leaves on the same tree! This was really interesting. Also, some leaf types can come in different shapes - for example, Neuropteris can be round at the base of a stem and elongated along the stem and at the tip...AND...some paleobotanists now classify cyclopteris - the round fan shaped leaf - as a form of Neuropteris. This definitely adds to the confusion. I'm still reading and trying to understand all of this and these are only my initial impressions, which are still forming and there may be explanations for some of these questions that I haven't discovered yet but these are the questions that I am trying to answer by reading, and of course, by fossil collecting. I hope that many of our new friend (and I should add, VERY COOL new friends!) on the fossil forum will help clarify some of these interesting questions. Hope this is helpful.
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Forgive me if I'm being impatient or repeating myself--I'm new to this site and forum. I tried posting this under Questions and Answers a while ago and haven't seen it appear yet--maybe there's an approval process that has to run its course before a post appears publicly. In case I just didn't get it entered correctly I'll try again under this heading, which I didn't see at first. ANYWAY . . . . Does anyone have experience removing iron stains from St. Clair, Pennsylvania plant fossils? The white mineral that provides the striking contrast with the slate is pyrophyllite, a silicate. As an avid mineral collector (sorry, not too knowledgeable about fossils, even though I grew up in eastern Iowa--I decided I couldn't be an expert on both and settled on minerals) I am familiar with using Iron Out, Waller's solution, oxalic acid, etc. to remove iron oxide stains from mineral specimens. Can iron oxide stains be removed (or at least lightened) on St. Clair fossils by soaking in one of those reagents? They shouldn't affect the pyrophyllite chemically, but I can see how removing the iron oxide could disrupt the coating physically. I do not intend to scrub them--I'm sure that would do more harm than good. Any other suggestions? Thanks!
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Here are a couple of "old" pieces from St. Clair that I found. The first one is a faint trace that I think is Pectopteris but I find it so rarely at St. Clair I can't tell for sure. What is throwing me off is that the leaflets are getting longer as they progress along the rachis whereas I have always thought that Pectopteris had a consistent leaflet length along the whole leaf. Then the second piece is a cluster of leaves/leaflets that don't match anything I've seen before. The tips of the leaves are not pointed enough for Alethopteris and not wide enough for Neuropteris. Any suggestions are appreciated.
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From the album: Plants
Fern non det. Upper Carboniferous Llewellyn Formation St. Clair Pennsylvania USA- 1 comment
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