I need help identifying a fossil

[Carrie]

[Innocentx]

My first impression is pine cone.

[Fossildude19]

Welcome to the Forum.  

 

Where was this found?

 

[Doctor Mud]

I'm thinking some type of coral.

Interesting looking thing. More info on locality and context is always helpful.

[caldigger]

This is an easy one...a neolithic thimble!

[Mike from North Queensland]

A high quality photo of the texture of the surface may help.

A gut feeling the object may be man made but interesting, context would help.

???

 

 

Mike D

[Ludwigia]

Sponge is also a possibility.

[TqB]

These look like Lepidodendron scales or a cone of some sort. 

 

[Carrie]

7 hours ago, caldigger said:

This is an easy one...a neolithic thimble!

Thank you...the hollow part isn't large enough to be a thimble. 

 

 

 I agree about it resembling the scales of the Lepidodendron. But it doesn't match any of the images I've found of the cones online. I'm stumped.

4 hours ago, TqB said:

These look like Lepidodendron scales or a cone of some sort.

[Carrie]

5 hours ago, Fossildude19 said:

Welcome to the Forum.  

 

Where was this found?

 

Thank you! Glad to have found this forum.  I wish I could remember exactly where I found it...I only know it was found in my home state of Arkansas (U.S.). I found it as a kid (I'm 43 now) ..I was always the kid with rocks in my pockets that I picked up..lol.  Always looking for fossils, arrowheads, crystals, etc.  I have always wondered what is was and have showed people and some say a tooth or a claw of some sort. 

[izak_]

Definitely  not a tooth or claw.

[Rockwood]

Cone fossils that look like this are external molds. It could be a mold of the tip of a Lepidostrobus.

[TqB]

12 minutes ago, Rockwood said:

Cone fossils that look like this are external molds. It could be a mold of the tip of a Lepidostrobus.

 

I think that's a strong contender.

[Rockwood]

Some may prefer to call it a cast. Mold molded in a mold, something like that 

[Al Dente]

The close up images show individual zooids of a bryozoan colony. I think this is either a domal bryozoan or a piece of a larger colony. Might even be internal cast of a colony, the void space filled with sediment and the calcite skeleton dissolved away.

[doushantuo]

I have to agree with Al Dente there.Those were my first thoughts also,especially with a thing that looks like a zooecial opening in the right place.Plus the packing of the units,which would be zooids in AD's interpretation.

underneath: Antropora ,Miocene, Florida 

edit: i've included the Einhornia pic not because I think the one in this thread is Einhornia,but because it kinda resembles it in a general way

For Lepidostrobus i looked at some of Barry Thomas's best work, and Brack's 1983 revision.

 

The resemblance is NOT stunning

 

[Rockwood]

18 minutes ago, Al Dente said:

The close up images show individual zooids of a bryozoan colony. I think this is either a domal bryozoan or a piece of a larger colony. Might even be internal cast of a colony, the void space filled with sediment and the calcite skeleton dissolved away.

I think you may have it there with the internal cast. Those do look more like openings. 

[TqB]

44 minutes ago, Al Dente said:

The close up images show individual zooids of a bryozoan colony. I think this is either a domal bryozoan or a piece of a larger colony. Might even be internal cast of a colony, the void space filled with sediment and the calcite skeleton dissolved away.

 

42 minutes ago, doushantuo said:

I have to agree with Al Dente there.Those were my first thoughts also,especially with a thing that looks like a zooecial opening in the right place.Plus the packing of the units,which would be zooids in AD's interpretation.

 

 

 

I agree they look like it but do any zooecia get that big? Going by the photo with the coin, they're about 5mm long - the few I've had a look at don't make it past 2mm, usually less than 1.5mm.

[doushantuo]

I know Marcus Key investigated some "giant" (Permian) bryozoans.Would have to look up the upper size limit of zooids.

And i made a beginners's error,I forgot about scale,and focused just on morphology

Is there a "corner of shame" on this forum?

edit:it might be:

 

"BRYOZILLA"

 

[doushantuo]

 

Tabulipora(max width of branches found 70 mm,length 200 mm

To the right,more normal-sized fragments

Key*,2005

*His father was Dutch ,so not pronounced like the thing to open locks with

"Gigantism has been recognized in various bryozoans, including several Ordovician trepostomes (Raizen et al. 1999), the Mississippian
trepostome Stenophragmidium sp. with >35 mm diameter branches (Wyse Jackson & Kora,unpublished data), the Cretaceous cyclostome
Pennipora anomalopora with 22 mm diameter branches (Taylor & Voigt 1999), the Pleistocene cheilostome Schizoporella sp. (Cuffey & Fonda
1976), and the Recent cheilostome Cellepora coronopus with 20 mm diameter branches."

 

 

 

[Arizona Chris]

That last shot shows what I would call bryozoan Zooicia, a bit worn for sure! its almost like an encrustation of a bryozoan on top of a urchin test.  (?)  

[Rockwood]

The openings could also be voids left by sporangia, the sporophyll it'self being largely unpreserved.

[Bullsnake]

The 'grill-mark' pattern is strange, but I was wondering if it's a crinoid cup, perhaps Agassizocrinus that is parasitized by a boring sponge. Would that be possible for a free-floating crinoid?

[abyssunder]

I think it could be a fossil sponge, something like Ventriculites or similar.

 

Picture from here

[TqB]

37 minutes ago, abyssunder said:

I think it could be a fossil sponge, something like Ventriculites or similar.

 

 

 

 

 

I did wonder, but the patterning looks too precise and regular?