Johnson County, Kansas Fossil Hunt

[Wrangellian]

Looks and sounds like you guys had an exciting day... Nice haul(s), That snail is great but I am intrigued by those scaphopods - I don't often hear of Paleozoic ones! I get very similar ones in my local U. Cret. which are pretty close to the modern ones. It's amazing how little those have changed. Simple design I guess.

[Bullsnake]

Looks and sounds like you guys had an exciting day... Nice haul(s), That snail is great but I am intrigued by those scaphopods - I don't often hear of Paleozoic ones! I get very similar ones in my local U. Cret. which are pretty close to the modern ones. It's amazing how little those have changed. Simple design I guess.

It was a great time, Wrangellian.

I have to make a rookie admission here, though. Had I found these on my own, and Missourian not been there, I would have thought they were orthocones.

However the lack of chambers/sutures would have puzzled me.

[Missourian]

.... but I am intrigued by those scaphopods - I don't often hear of Paleozoic ones! I get very similar ones in my local U. Cret. which are pretty close to the modern ones. It's amazing how little those have changed. Simple design I guess.

Except at this spot, scaphopods are quite rare in the rocks around here. The genus Paleodentalium (technically a subgenus of Dentalium) was raised by a local geology professor soon after the deposit was excavated in the 1970s. If you're interested, an article can be found in the Journal of Paleontology, v. 48, no. 6, p. 1213-1216. (1974).

Edited February 24, 2013 by Missourian