Catskill Formation 2023

[Paul1719]

Of course placoderms are everywhere in the Devonian. Bothriolepis is one of the most common fish in the Catskill and all over the world. They tend to be in fresh water closer to the sea but I have found plates even in the RH lag material that I believe are Bothriolepis. Maybe these are coming out of the main river channel during the flood event that created the lag deposit. Most are isolated plates but some articulated fish have been found at the Blossburg site. It also tends to be associated with Holoptychius, a porolepiform sarcopterygian.

 

Turrisaspis is the sunfish of the Devonian. An arthrodire placoderm, it is also ubiquitous. This is a specimen collected in 2018 but with only a small portion of the median dorsal plate showing. When I was getting ready to move in 2019 and deciding what to take, I started picking away at it and before long realized it was complete articulated fish. I recently finished the prep of it which suggest even the parts you can't see are inside the rock!

 

 

Turrisaspis from Red Hill, 2018

[Fossildude19]

@Paul1719

 

I was hoping you would post this!  Love this fossil!

Absolutely stunning!      

[Jeffrey P]

Wow! That Turriaspis is awful sweet. A spectacular find! Congrats on that and your other Catskills Formation finds. Wonderful thread 

[Paul1719]

Thanks! A few more fossils of placoderms. Phyllolepis is either an arthrodire or in a sister taxon to the order Arthrodira. It was an ambush predator hiding in the mud at the bottom. Its eyes were reduced to almost nothing but had a very sensitive lateral line system.  While we have come across many plate fragments and even articulated ones the plates are so fragile they tend to disintegrate if you look at them wrong. So here is an example I recently was able to isolate from the big block of lag material from the Blossburg site. Most of the material in this block is very processed like it went through the food processor so it's a little remarkable this survives somewhat intact.

 

And here is a more complete Phyllolepis specimen from the boulder field between the N and S lanes of Rt15 near Cogan House exit. It appears to be (I believe) the separation of the dorsal and ventral shields. So visceral side of each. If you look at the far right side, you can see the impression of its telltale concentric ridges! Not sure what to do with it? I may try to pick the plates off one side to expose the impression?

[Fossildude19]

18 minutes ago, Paul1719 said:

Thanks! A few more fossils of placoderms. Phyllolepis is either an arthrodire or in a sister taxon to the order Arthrodira. It was an ambush predator hiding in the mud at the bottom. Its eyes were reduced to almost nothing but had a very sensitive lateral line system.  While we have come across many plate fragments and even articulated ones the plates are so fragile they tend to disintegrate if you look at them wrong. So here is an example I recently was able to isolate from the big block of lag material from the Blossburg site. Most of the material in this block is very processed like it went through the food processor so it's a little remarkable this survives somewhat intact.

 

And here is a more complete Phyllolepis specimen from the boulder field between the N and S lanes of Rt15 near Cogan House exit. It appears to be (I believe) the separation of the dorsal and ventral shields. So visceral side of each. If you look at the far right side, you can see the impression of its telltale concentric ridges! Not sure what to do with it? I may try to pick the plates off one side to expose the impression?

 

 

Remarkable finds! 

[Paul1719]

Thanks Tim!

These have been all short and mostly unplanned trips. Completely dependent on weather and Ian's availability. I thought in my retirement I'd be spending weeks there at a time. I am going Tues to help Dave Broussard extract a Dunkelosteus infragnathal in the Lock Haven at Blossburg. Other than that I'd like to chase that lag block up the hill or more like it down the hill. I spent a few years after I stopped playing serious  rugby rock climbing. Great skill set to have.

[Paul1719]

Another couple enigmatic fossils from Rt15. The first is a chunk of bone with what looks like an articulating surface that is buttressed. There are a couple breaks but it appears most of the bone is here. This is clearly fresh water channel margin sediments. Ted Daeschler and Jason Downs but felt like it's Groenlandaspis which does have similar plates but I have seen a bunch of placoderm plates and it looks nothing like them. It may simply be that is what it is but it may also be a function of difficulty in id'ing from an image and so eventually it will be sent to Philly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We also found this spine? I would have thought surely Groenlandaspis but this is a fairly common "mystery" fossil found in this part of the Catskill. 

[Fossildude19]

Sweet! 

[Paul1719]

Back to PA a couple weeks ago to help professor Dave Broussard, Lycoming College in Williamsport with a Dunkleosteus plate he was trying to recover from one of the boulder fields on the side of Rt 15 between Blossburg and Covington. The boulder this plate was on was large. Possibly 250 lbs. It was Catskill so probably fresh water but must have been large channel near shore which could have been up around the Tioga rest stop. They are typically found in Marine sediments.

First we split off a big chunk of very hard sandstone. That got the weight down to maybe 150 lbs. I had a number of ideas on how we'd get it up the slope but in the end we just muscled it up a foot or two at a time. Probably at least 100 feet. Got it up to the guardrail and on the dolly then hauled it back to the truck which seemed about half a mile away…. not that far. This will be part of his research project looking at what is going on around the early tetrapods there. 

 

 

 

Image of full nuchal plate heavily covered in field consolident from a pretty big fish!

[Paul1719]

This is the one that got away. Across the highway (Rt 15), at the base of the massive road cut is where most of the material I have collected here has come from. My trip at the end of July yielded mostly building stone but I came across another giant block (same one the Phyllolepis came from above) , this time it was lag material with an assortment of mostly pureed fish bits but Split-able and I managed to get it back to my truck. When I finally got around to examining it at home, I realized there was an unusual impression with a small piece of bone still in there. I am convinced this has to have been a lungfish jaw with at least part of a tooth plate. Daeschler and students found a lungfish skull there last year so not total surprise but I think jaws are really rare. Unfortunately, I have searched everywhere here for missing pieces and they must have been lost somewhere at the site. :^(

The impression with a small fragment of the jaw.

[Fossildude19]

18 minutes ago, Paul1719 said:

This is the one that got away. Across the highway (Rt 15), at the base of the massive road cut is where most of the material I have collected here has come from. My trip at the end of July yielded mostly building stone but I came across another giant block (same one the Phyllolepis came from above) , this time it was lag material with an assortment of mostly pureed fish bits but Split-able and I managed to get it back to my truck. When I finally got around to examining it at home, I realized there was an unusual impression with a small piece of bone still in there. I am convinced this has to have been a lungfish jaw with at least part of a tooth plate. Daeschler and students found a lungfish skull there last year so not total surprise but I think jaws are really rare. Unfortunately, I have searched everywhere here for missing pieces and they must have been lost somewhere at the site. :^(

 

 

 

Disappointing, I'm sure, but a cool find! 

I'm sure more will turn up in subsequent visits!

Great work, Paul!

[Paul1719]

One more recycled fossil from 2019. I never posted this image of the Tristichopterid (Eusthenodon bourdoni ) found at the Cogan House exit on Rt 15. This is what I uncovered in my ex-wife's driveway while I was laid-off and deciding whether to retire and had just sold my house and waiting to close on one in CT. Daeschler and Downs were in the process of writing a paper on this fish and so a couple weeks later I was heading to Philadelphia to donate it to the Academy of Natural Sciences. As you can clearly see it's the whole skull table, parietal and post parietal shields with a good dose of snout, cheek and extra scapular series (ME, LE -which is on the piece that came off there). Everything is so clear! 

 

After prep by Fred Mullison

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Caudal fin        and Pectoral fin (missing humerus, ulna and radius) recovered after me, Tim and Jim had met there and found the elusive layer these were coming from! These 4 images are from Ted Daeschler.