LabRatKing Posted July 19, 2023 Share Posted July 19, 2023 Hi gang. Just 72 hours away from my first real endurance run in years. Starting the thread now as is easier for me to share everything in "real time" rather than writing one big post. Will be hitting a new to me site in Indiana first, a brief stop in Virginia, hitting my olde home state of Pennsylvania for a few days, and will button it up with Mazon Creek. The scienceMobile is loaded down with gear and sampling supplies for both my hobbies and my job. More to follow... 8 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ludwigia Posted July 19, 2023 Share Posted July 19, 2023 Greetings from the Lake of Constance. Roger http://www.steinkern.de/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pagurus Posted July 19, 2023 Share Posted July 19, 2023 Wonderful. It's fantastic when your hobby merges with your job. Enjoy the trip and good luck. Don't forget to bring a towel. 1 Start the day with a smile and get it over with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FossilNerd Posted July 23, 2023 Share Posted July 23, 2023 Good luck! Can’t wait to see what your adventure brings! The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it. -Neil deGrasse Tyson Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don't. -Bill Nye (The Science Guy) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 27, 2023 Author Share Posted July 27, 2023 Has been a mad dash in the ScienceMobile. Seven states in Four days. Many of the planned fossil sites I visited were a wash both figurative and literal. Lots of flash flooding, high winds, and hail so many of my old haunts were underwater or otherwise inaccessible. I did score a few nice finds at the old Family farms around Erie County, PA. I'll share photos once I get to Joliet, IL Friday night as signals and bandwidth are sketchy here. If all goes according to plan, Mazon Creek Friday evening and then all day Saturday. Lots of warnings about heat, but I've hunted in worse. Rain or shine, I'll get my bucket of concretions. As a teaser, here is an extant species (Psephenidae) of arthropod that is as close to a living trilobite as you can find. Is about 12mm. Is actually the aquatic larvae of a beetle. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 28, 2023 Author Share Posted July 28, 2023 I have arrived at Mazon Creek. Time to get sweaty and dirty! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 28, 2023 Author Share Posted July 28, 2023 Welp, #3 is a wash, though pretty and a heck of a hike. Hear index calculates out to be 119F at this location, so I'm retiring to the hotel for AC and research. No worries, have all day tomorrow! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 29, 2023 Author Share Posted July 29, 2023 Well, took me a few hours, but I'm finding concretions. No joke, I am channeling Alan Quartermane and Indiana Jones here people! Time to head back to the sciencemobile for lunch, then back to it. Tried to find the big spoil pile you see all the pictures of, briefly saw the peak, then lost it. This is one of the toughest fossil hunts I have ever done. Mazon is choked with invasive species and it is cloudy with 100% humidity. Only one definite fossil and about two dozen concretions. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shellseeker Posted July 29, 2023 Share Posted July 29, 2023 3 hours ago, LabRatKing said: Well, took me a few hours, but I'm finding concretions. No joke, I am channeling Alan Quartermane and Indiana Jones here people! What ever does not kill you..... 2 The White Queen ".... in her youth she could believe "six impossible things before breakfast" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 29, 2023 Author Share Posted July 29, 2023 Well gang, I got a bunch of concretions and a few definite fossils. I have to go on record stating "the good ol' days" of fossil hunting are over here. Most of the Pit 11/south unit is absolutely NOT for beginners. I'm pretty hardcore, but no amount of winter dormancy is going to make it better. The easy access sites were either closed or devoid of fossils. The other areas are completely overgrown with invasive species like Amur honeysuckle, roses, ornamental hawthorn, and even PEACH trees. Thickets so thick that you need a machete. I logged 10 hours around various sites, most of it literally crawling through the underbrush. The place is in desperate need of controlled burns and invasive species management if the hope to continue with the "reclamation". I'll post a new thread with any finds at a later date. 1 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 29, 2023 Author Share Posted July 29, 2023 I should add that while it is a extremely difficult hunt, it was worth it. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 30, 2023 Author Share Posted July 30, 2023 So first up is a conundrum. I collected this sometime between March 1999 and September 2000. I have no memory of it. My mom had it in an unopened box of stuff I had mailed home while active duty all those years ago. It is likely from one of three places: Southern California, Arizona, or the Atacama Desert, Chile near Caleta Cinfuncho. Only places I was fossil hunting in those days. The dates and locations are known only by the photos and uniforms that were also in the box. Either way, it is a spectacular piece almost entirely composed of fossils large and small. Many horn corals, brachiopods, and crinoid stems. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 30, 2023 Author Share Posted July 30, 2023 Next, got my Mazon nodules washed soaking. They were already pretty wet due to heavy rains and seriously mean undergrowth. Is about six dozen, roughly a quarter of a 20L/5 US gallon bucket. I grabbed about a dozen partially split naturally that are most definitely just blobs as I want to experiment with them using the -80C freezer and liquid nitrogen at work...because, you know, science and stuff. There is about a dozen that have an exciting shape and size to them. More on these as they pop. I didn't attempt to split any on site as it was a harrowing 12 hour day and I know better than to try such things while exhausted. Added bonus: there's a pub in nearby Morris, Illinois that any tired and hungry fossil hunter should visit afterwards... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 31, 2023 Author Share Posted July 31, 2023 And these two aren't all that exciting - brachiopod hash plates from Erie County, Pennsylvania - so common we used to pave our driveway with them, but these are from the place it all started for me- the creek on the site of the old family farm. Spent my formative years with these and was very gracious the new owners have just let it go wild AND granted me permission to hike and grab a few fossils! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DPS Ammonite Posted July 31, 2023 Share Posted July 31, 2023 (edited) 5 hours ago, LabRatKing said: So first up is a conundrum. I collected this sometime between March 1999 and September 2000. I have no memory of it. My mom had it in an unopened box of stuff I had mailed home while active duty all those years ago. It is likely from one of three places: Southern California, Arizona, or the Atacama Desert, Chile near Caleta Cinfuncho. Only places I was fossil hunting in those days. They don’t look like any Paleozoic fossils that I have seen from Arizona. I don’t remember seeing or hearing about any good Paleozoic sites with similar fossils in Southern California. Most of the Paleozoic layers are related to the ones east in Arizona, but are somewhat metamorphosed. If you include the White and Inyo Mountain in Southern California then maybe. You might want to get geological maps of the areas and see if suitable formations exist near areas that you have visited. Edited July 31, 2023 by DPS Ammonite 1 My goal is to leave no stone or fossil unturned. See my Arizona Paleontology Guide link The best single resource for Arizona paleontology anywhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 31, 2023 Author Share Posted July 31, 2023 9 hours ago, DPS Ammonite said: They don’t look like any Paleozoic fossils that I have seen from Arizona. I don’t remember seeing or hearing about any good Paleozoic sites with similar fossils in Southern California. Most of the Paleozoic layers are related to the ones east in Arizona, but are somewhat metamorphosed. If you include the White and Inyo Mountain in Southern California then maybe. You might want to get geological maps of the areas and see if suitable formations exist near areas that you have visited. yeah, gonna have to hit the books hard to jog my memory! Is a very distinct possibility Chile was the source. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LabRatKing Posted July 31, 2023 Author Share Posted July 31, 2023 Here are the first of some of my Mazon nodules: A nice Aviculopecten, 25mm A ?calamites, 50mm end to end and what I think is another ?calamites, 25mm 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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