Triassic Reference Material

[flyguy784]

I've managed to collect a fair amount of late Triassic petrified wood, Lockatong formation, southeastern PA. I'm having trouble finding info and images of bark impressions. Any help with some sites/books etc. would be greatly appreciated.

[Frank Menser]

Wish I could hepl but it's not in my area. However, it would relly be cool to see some pics?

[flyguy784]

Thanks for the reply Frank. I'll try to get some pics up. My photo set up leaves alot to be desired aand work has been totaly comsuming as of late. It's just very hard to find good referance material for this time period. I as well have a very unusual Pennsylvanian piece from St. Clair I'd like to have some info on. Again, thanks for the reply, I'll see what I can do.

[erose]

A number of years back I collected some coelacanth fossils from Lockatong rocks that had had been dumped in the NJ Meadowlands. I had a hard time finding references until I started using the search term "Newark Supergroup." Much of the early Mesozoic rocks along the entire east coast fall under this category. Just a thought.

[mhorn]

I suppose you will find something interesting at the personal web-page by Dr. Paul E. Olsen from the Columbia University. Here there is hyperlink to his publications page: http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~polsen/nbcp/peo.cv2.html

Many Triassic publications of the different regions of the world are also available through Chinese web-site: http://work.geobiology.cn/ (it is lack an English version, but its navigation could be understood by using translate.google.com service)

Russian Triassic publications are available from here: http://www.jurassic.ru/triassic.eng.htm

[siteseer]

I consulted "Dawn of the Dinosaurs: Life in the Triassic," by Nicholas Fraser. It is a very nice review of the Triassic world (meant for a mainstream reader yet surprisingly detailed) though its focus is more on the animals. It mentions the Lockatong on a few pages but does not show any of its plants. I couldn't find any references that note it specifically in the bibliography, though as suggested by erose, there were a few that had "Newark Supergroup" in the title which you might have already run across. From what I did notice in the bibilography, articles authored/co-authored by P.E. Olsen, as offered by mhorn, would be a good start in your research.

You might know about it already, but years ago, there was a coffee table book published, "Petrified Wood: The World of Fossilized Wood, Cones, Ferns, and Cycads" by Frank J. Daniels (Western Colorado Publishing Company). It got a good review in Rock & Gem magazine. Some nice-looking postcards showing the front cover were given out at the Tucson shows that year. Check it out if you haven't already.

[flyguy784]

Thanks guys. I will look into the book. I don't have it, yet! I hunt in the Newark Group formations(Lockatong, Stockton etc) most of the time. It's close, therefore an easy trip for me. There are tracks although I've yet to find any, I will. I do however find a decent amount of various plant material. Enough to keep me intriqued. The problem is that there just doesn't seem to be much referance material out there for Triassic plant material.