Show Us Your Biggest Fossil Plant Finds

[RomanK]

Saturday ,Hervé my friend found a nice sigillaria bark...ribs are 1 centimeter wide

best regards

Bruno

Hi Bruno, your sites are so fruitful for great preservation finds, I'm just envious. Nice find, really nice!

I have overpassed the 1,000 posts barrier by the way. Wow! Could I think about!!!

Edited July 7, 2010 by RomanK

[MikeD]

This is far from the biggest piece of petrified wood that I have found, but it is the biggest that I have managed to bring home. The stuff is heavy and this one is about 200 pounds.

[RomanK]

This is far from the biggest piece of petrified wood that I have found, but it is the biggest that I have managed to bring home. The stuff is heavy and this one is about 200 pounds.

Hi Mike, very impressive piece. Yes, you're right it's not possible simetimes to pick up a very big specimen to home. This stem of Araucariales I found is still on it place.

[Ludwigia]

Hi Mike, very impressive piece. Yes, you're right it's not possible simetimes to pick up a very big specimen to home. This stem of Araucariales I found is still on it place.

Ooooo! That's very big!

This isn't anything I've found myself, but they've been digging in the woods under Chemnitz again and I thought this might be interesting for some of you.

http://www.chemnitz.de/chemnitz/de/stadt_chemnitz/stadtportrait/sehenswuerdigkeiten/sehenswertes_versteinerter_wald_grabung.asp

Best wishes, Roger

[RomanK]

Ooooo! That's very big!

This isn't anything I've found myself, but they've been digging in the woods under Chemnitz again and I thought this might be interesting for some of you.

http://www.chemnitz....ald_grabung.asp

Best wishes, Roger

Thanks Roger, unfortunately I can't read in German.

[RomanK]

These are the biggest Stigmaria I've still found.

[Ludwigia]

Thanks Roger, unfortunately I can't read in German.

Sorry. . Well, the pictures are nice anyway.

[Frank Menser]

Not the biggest piece in my collection, but the biggest I have found.

This one came from Monument Valley, Utah. In 1981, my friend and I had visited the Petrified forest and were on our way back east. We stopped for the night at a tourist 'look out' site that consited of a few metal poles sunk in the ground with crude scopes attached to the top--apparently to pinpoint certain buttes in the distance.

Since there was still some light left, we decided to hunt the imediate area and see what turned up. About 80 yards from the road I found the remains of an old river bed. Exploring that I found several pieces of wood. This one was the largest at nearly a foot long.

A bit later, I hiked to the nearest Butte to collect a 'pebble' for our Rock Club sponsor, a Professor at BCC,Broward County, Florida. This was a running joke as we generally found the largest boulder we could carry and presented it to him. As I was carrying the nearly three feet long chunk of red sandstone back to our van, darkness fell. The stars came out. My friend placed a lantern atop our van to guide me in, but since the land had a series of dips and rises, I could only see it part of the time. There were cattle mooing in the dark. Then came the sound of Indian drums. It was Saturday night and the Navajo were having a good time. It was as if I were transported back in time. Any second I expected to see riders come ove the nearest ridge, bow and guns in hand. For a few minutes I walked in another century.

One thing interesting about this piece is when I first collected it, the surface was covered with a fine druse of crystals. When I took it out to photograph again today, I noticed the crystals (probably calcite) have apparently disintigrated.

Edited July 7, 2010 by Frank Menser

[RomanK]

Hi Frank, I was really impessed by your trip mini essay. Just was carried away back to my childhood to the first James Fenimore Cooper book I red. Thanks, and very good piece of wood called up your memory. .

This is my biggest Devonian plant find I found in wild step which is associated in my imagination with nomad people like Scythians. Regards, Roman

[Plantguy]

Thanks Roger, unfortunately I can't read in German.

Roman, Good to see all of the plant material you and MikeD, Bruno, Ludwigia and Frank and the others have found. Most of my finds are all relatively very small---I have a number of trades/purchases that are good sized, but someday I hope to retire with a large rock outcrop or a coal mine near by and drag home some behemoth sized specimens like you guys have found or at least sit on a few piles of material and take photos and think about bringing them home and/or to a museum!!!

Ludwigia/Roman, I looked at the article. Thanks for sharing. Interesting site! I put it in a transalator and it was translated as....

2008 the Museum of natural history on an almost 500 square metre area Frankenberger Street 61 organised a scientific excavation. This is probably the first paleontological dig at all beyond sporadic finds in the daily construction. The excavations aimed to gain knowledge about the world of the perms. It was also in situ a unique chance, a preserved in Tuff, over 290 million years old ecosystem (where this is of course that) can be found and explore in detail. For the time of the early perms, three-dimensional structure preserved Permineralisationen from Chemnitz among the world's most significant plant fossils. Canopy of long extinct plants with ansitzenden branches were found during the excavations. For the first time, it will be possible estimate the density and the structure of vegetation and to reconstruct their living conditions.

Modeling: The 3D-Funddaten used to model the fossils in this way. Multiple sensing chess events were conducted on the site in October 2007. In preparation of the excavation surface backscatter measurements, which took place in December 2007 and January and April 2008 Georadar processes (ground penetrating radar) and Widerstands­geoelektrik were checked for suitability. Also, it was examined whether and to what depth petrified Woods - particularly larger tribes - can be localized by the measurement method which was not possible. Two widerstandsgeoelektrische surface measurements were carried out, where about 100 electrodes at a distance of two metres were angeodnet: even in January and - after the removal of topsoil - in April 2008. Already significant resistance anomalies could be recorded. The second measurement a lying about 0.35 m were diameter identify 3 m below the top of the site. Arthropitys: so far most valuable Fund from the Grabungssaison 2008, a multiple branched horsetail tree the excavations were from April until mid November 2008 each Monday to Friday. Weekends, guided tours were offered to the population. To break the excavations end November 2008 2 / 3 of the excavation area at 4 m were exposed about depth. Work will continue in spring 2009. On the one hand the scientific expectations were exceeded already now, on the other hand no comprehensive evaluation and analysis of the data obtained can be done at this stage yet. Around 200 finds have been catalogued. Since October 2008 at the Museum of natural history to see are some of the most spectacular.

Regards, Chris

[RomanK]

Roman, Good to see all of the plant material you and MikeD, Bruno, Ludwigia and Frank and the others have found. Most of my finds are all relatively very small---I have a number of trades/purchases that are good sized, but someday I hope to retire with a large rock outcrop or a coal mine near by and drag home some behemoth sized specimens like you guys have found or at least sit on a few piles of material and take photos and think about bringing them home and/or to a museum!!!

Ludwigia/Roman, I looked at the article. Thanks for sharing. Interesting site! I put it in a transalator and it was translated as....

Regards, Chris

Chris, you was so kind to translate that material, thank you very much indeed. You can realise you dream just to buy the small house near the heap in Donetsk.

Edited July 9, 2010 by RomanK

[Ludwigia]

"I put it in a transalator and it was translated as...."

Thanks Chris. That was a very good deed! I'm just a beginner in this virtual world and am just lucky enough to be pushing the right buttons here.

Best wishes, Roger

[RomanK]

Print of the Lepidodendron thick branch in the mudstone.

[fossildan]

RomanK..... Very nice examples.....Heres a couple of mine.....

Sigillaria Trunk & Lepidodendron Trunk

Calamites? & Paripteris cf gigantea

Steve,

love them trunks there fantastic

where do they come from ?

Danny

[fossildan]

Ok heres mine, not sure on species. must have been a massive tree judging by the growth rings.

Edited July 9, 2010 by fossildan

[Terry Dactyll]

Danny...... They came from Crockhey Opencast..... The 'Best' one was chosen to go in Lapworth Museum a few years ago by the curator, but the last I heard they 'had health and safety issues' to overcome before they could display it..... It needed bolting down or something to prevent possible injury.....

[Terry Dactyll]

Kids could jump up and down all day on this, it must be over a metre across.....it must be the biggest stump ive ever come across.....

[Auspex]

Kids could jump up and down all day on this, it must be over a metre across.....it must be the biggest stump ive ever come across.....

Sometimes, it's good to be "stumped".

[RomanK]

Kids could jump up and down all day on this, it must be over a metre across.....it must be the biggest stump ive ever come across.....

Hi Steve, you posted the really impressing stump! Envy your sites.

[RomanK]

Not small Lepidodendron bark specimen I founfd this morning

[docdutronc]

Hi my friends

the biggest fossil plants ,some Sigillaria trunks ,the grey trunk comes from Hazard (Kentucky) .

best regars

Bruno

[docdutronc]

During my trip to Spain I saw these trunks (Cordaites ?) at the entrance of a private museum .

Edited July 14, 2012 by docdutronc

[Rockin' Ric]

Roman, here are my largest plant finds from the Pottsville formation running through Alabama USA.

Crucicalamite approximately 1' long

Stigmaria, Artisia, Lepidodendron and Calamite approximately 1.5' or 2' long

The longest Calamite is approximately 2.5' long and the Calamite end piece is approximately 1' long

Stigmaria with rootlets in situ approximately 3' long

[Fossildude19]

Nice Big finds, Ric!

Good to see you posting again!

Regards,

[ntrusc]

Great finds everyone,

Leidodendron section, Alethopteris decurrens on shale, Stigmaria, unidentified trunk.

Thanks

Neil.

Edited July 16, 2012 by ntrusc