I've been meaning to photograph some of the great stuff my fossil comrade from Connecticut, Tim, kindly gave me after our big dig in Penn Dixie First up on the top left are specimens of the Devonian gastropod, Glyptotomariz retispiralede collected from Deep Springs Road, Earlville NY. To the top right is another from the same area, Grammysoidea arcuata. On the lower left are Bembexia sp. gastropods from Morrisville, NY. To the bottom right from Deep Springs Road is Paleozygopleura hamiltonensis These lovely fish plates are Redfieldius gracilis from the Shuttle Meadow Fm (Jurassic). These ferns come at a premium now, as they were collected at St Clair, PA where there is no permitted collecting at the site anymore. The lighting and the faint impressions these generally leave may make this harder to make out, but these are partials and pieces of the fish, Diplurus newarki - a fish my comrade Tim has been studying and collecting for 20 years. These are coprolites. Yes, fossilized poop. On the left is a coprolite (likely a reptile extruded this one) from the Triassic, while the ones on the right are from the Jurassic. We can learn a lot from studying coprolites, such as diet and environment. I also have a few pieces of Otozamites latior that do not photograph well. Tim was also kind enough to provide me with two trilobite specimens I did not have (see last blog post). Shifting gears in the same post, I took a trip to my local honey hole and was entirely skunked. At the very least, I got to be within 7-8 feet of a fairly trusting and majestic bird. I apologize for the poor pixel quality - I only had my iPod with me at the time, and I needed to zoom in a bit as it would have flown away had I approached any closer: So the afternoon was spent at Hungry Hollow where I collected small bits. The river was too dangerous after all the rainfall to risk going to the usual spots, so we hunkered down in the south pit and plucked weathered stuff out of the Arkona Fm mud-shale. Although I have tons of this stuff, I can't help but to continue picking it up. You never know when someone might want some of it as a gift. Typical fare from Arkona: an array of crinoid bits, some Aulopora, brachs, Microcyclus ("button coral"), tons of Bactrites, and on the right edge in descending order of size, Tornoceras (or is it Goniatites? - I'm not a cephalopod guy).
Below are some microscope shots to bring out details at 75x: Comments are closed.
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Kane Faucher
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February 2024
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