Very inexperienced/novice “fossil hunter” from Florida

[FossilBoy94]

Hi all,

 

I’m pretty inexperienced and have been starting by going sharks tooth hunting around Venice Beach, FL as it is very accessible for me and always a guaranteed find of at least a few teeth! This is my third or fourth time and we decided to take a whole bucket to sift through on dry ground in good light, and starting setting aside anything that looked interesting in addition to teeth and ray spine fragments. When we found this piece, we all agreed (with no real knowledge to back this up however) that it looked manmade and too unnatural to not be a tool of some sort. As far as texture/material, it appears very similar to the bone/teeth fossils commonly found at Casperson Beach. Any help with identification? It would be greatly appreciated  thanks!

[Fossildude19]

Welcome to the Forum.  

This looks like a fish fin spine, something like a catfish pectoral or dorsal spine.

[FossilBoy94]

Just now, Fossildude19 said:

Welcome to the Forum.  

This looks like a fish fin spine, something like a catfish pectoral or dorsal spine.

Ahh! Not as interesting as we hoped but still a cool piece! Thanks for responding so quickly!! I’m definitely going to have more questions as my friends and I get more into this. Much thanks!

[Shellseeker]

Examples:  

 

and 

 

 

When they are complete, and fossilizaed,  I love finding them.  Keep Looking

[digit]

Agreed. Many large fishes have these large pectoral and dorsal fin spines which end up in the Florida fossil record. The ones from the saltwater catfish have small barbs running the length of the spine--spines from other species don't have these barbs. Your item is likely too worn to positively determine if it once had barbs along its length. The hole in the proximal end is where this spine (and often a smaller spine) looped through the bone (called a pterygiophore) that is embedded in the body of the fish to secure the spine. The bases of pectoral fin spines are usually somewhat asymmetrical where as the dorsal fin spine (being midline to the fish) is usually much more symmetrical. Hard to say conclusively but your fin spine appears symmetrical enough to be from the dorsal fin.

 

Fish fin spines are commonly found at the Montbrook dig site up here in north central Florida (near Gainesville). More than once I've been skewered by one of these still sharp and pointy spines while digging at the site.

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken