Fossil hunting weekend to Falaises des Vaches Noires (Jurassic of France) + museum visit

[ziggycardon]

Hi everyone!

 

Last week we went on a weekend trip with our fossil club the BVP to go on a fossil hunt to the jurassic clay cliffs "Falaises de Vaches Noires" between Houlgate & Villers-Sur-Mer in Normandy, France.

https://www.paleontica.org/locations/fossil/68

 

The famous cliffs of Vaches Noires date back to the Jurassic period, and span both the Callovian & Oxfordian stages (166 - 157 mya) and the Cretaceous period spanning the Cenomanian (100 - 94 mya).
Back in the jurassic this area was a rich marine environment and fossils that can be found here are many species of bivalves (like Gryphaea, Lopha & Myophorella), ammonites, gastropods, belemnites, brachiopods, crinoïds, sponges and other invertebrates. 
The cliffs are also known for marine reptile material and even dinosaur material, though these finds are rather rare but you'll see some nice pieces in the museum pics later.

 

We arrived Thursday afternoon (november 3th) and stayed to Sunday (november 6th). We were very happy to join this trip organized by our club since it is probably the last year that fossil searching is allowed in this amazing location.
We were with around 27 people I believe and met each morning at the entrance of the beach at Houlgate.  

We searched the cliffs for 2 days and went to the local museum "paleospace" on sunday.

The weather was amazing for the 2 days of searching, it was even sunny the first day! 

The first few hours we mainly searched among the rocks on the beach which were littered with large Gryphaea fossils and other bivalves like Lopha gregarea. After our lunch break we moved on to search more near the clay to find smaller fossils.

On our second day we again searched the clay, went through some interesting places in the sand which were littered with oysters, gastropods and had some ammonite and crinoïd fossils and we ended the day at the cenomanian rocks in search for some fossil urchins.

 

The Cenomanian rocks on the beach

 

A piece a chalcedony

 

A partial ammonite

 

Me very happy with my first complete ammonite, which I found next to me while having lunch

 

One of the mystery fossils which nobody could really determine (we brought it home along another we found) 

The tubes seem to be pyritised. I believe it to be some kind of Echinoderm and someone suggested it might be a Crinoïd with a parasite on it.

 

But eventually our top finding (and the best of the entire trip) was spotted by my girlfriend Elise and is this gorgeous fish (probably Lepidotes sp.)

 

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On Sunday we visited the local museum in Villers-Sur-Mer which is filled with local fossils from the Vaches Noires cliffs. 

 

A Plesiosaur skeleton

 

 

Machimosaurus skeleton

 

Anna the Opthalmosaurus found in the USA (Kansas is believe if I r

 

 

Liopleurodon skeleton

note: I do believe most of these skeletons are replica's, but it wasn't really clearly written anywhere so I am not sure.

 

The famous ammonite chair made by Ferdinand Postel

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Metriorhynchus sp.

 

5: Steneosaurus sp.

6: Metriorhynchus sp.

 

 

 

Metriorhynchus vertebrae

 

1: Steneosaurus edwardsi

2: Steneosaurus osteoderms

 

Metriorhynchus brachyrhynchus

 

Pliosaur material

 

Liopleurodon ferox teeth

 

 

Dinosaur material

 

Streptospondylus altdorfensis

 

 

 

 

27: Leedsichthys problematicus

 

33: Shark Teeth (cenomanian)

34: Sphenodus teeth

 

Fish material

 

Lepidotes scales

 

Asteracanthus material

 

Asteracathus

 

Hybodus sp. material

 

the rest of the museum + our finds will follow tomorrow and the days that follow

Edited November 8, 2022 by ziggycardon

[Paleorunner]

Thank you for sharing this good report. 

[pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon]

Awesome photo-report, Ken! I'd have loved to join on this trip as I indeed expect this to realistically be the last year searching will be allowed there. But I guess I signed up with BVP just a little too late (actually only two weeks ago - never got a response to my request on whether I could still join this excursion). Unfortunately, it looks like most of the Callovian clay was covered up with sand, however, which would've made the trip less worthwhile for me anyway... But this partial fish your girlfriend found is truly spectacular! I don't think they've even got something like that in the museum!

 

Speaking of Paleospace: I believe all of the fully mounted suspended skeletons are actually casts/replicas, although the ichthyosaur is real (if not heavily restored).

[grandpa]

Thanks for taking us along on your trip.  I enjoyed being there virtually.

[Tidgy's Dad]

Super report and loads of really excellent photos. 

Thanks for taking us with you on your journey, Ken. 

[ziggycardon]

36 minutes ago, pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon said:

Awesome photo-report, Ken! I'd have loved to join on this trip as I indeed expect this to realistically be the last year searching will be allowed there. But I guess I signed up with BVP just a little too late (actually only two weeks ago - never got a response to my request on whether I could still join this excursion). Unfortunately, it looks like most of the Callovian clay was covered up with sand, however, which would've made the trip less worthwhile for me anyway... But this partial fish your girlfriend found is truly spectacular! I don't think they've even got something like that in the museum!

 

Speaking of Paleospace: I believe all of the fully mounted suspended skeletons are actually casts/replicas, although the ichthyosaur is real (if not heavily restored).

Thank you and I am indeed afraid so... 
Tom shared a little bit of the planned agenda for next year and they did indeed decide to not go next year just to wait and see how things develop. 
But maybe a little exclusive news, they have planned a 3 day trip to 3 different quarries in Solnhofen next year. But that is all I can say so far  

And yes thank you, they only had loose scale, but no articulated specimens it seemed. 

Edited November 8, 2022 by ziggycardon

[ziggycardon]

Corals, Sponges & Annelid worms

 

 

Bivalves

 

 

9: Nuculoma cottaldi

10: Nuculoma cf. longiuscula

11: Nuculoma calliope

 

 

Ammonites

 

 

Belemnites

 

 

Petrified wood & Brachiopods

 

 

Crinoïds

 

 

Gastropods

 

 

Sea urchins

 

Tripneustes parkinsoni found in Lacoste, Vaucluse, France (Miocene)

 

 

Gastropods

 

Edited November 9, 2022 by ziggycardon

[ziggycardon]

A temporary exhibit about crocodile fossils:

 

Metriorhynchus found in Villers-Sur-Mer

 

 

Mesosaurus

 

 

Pythosaur

 

 

Pelagosaurus

 

 

Teleidosaurus

 

 

 

 

Metriorhynchus superciliosus

 

 

Metriorhynchus

 

 

 

 

Steneosaurus

 

 

Sarcosuchus skull replica

 

 

Steneosaurus

 

 

Machimosaurus

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Alligatorellis beaumontis found in Cerin, L'Ain, France (Jurassic, 157 - 152 mya)

 

 

Atoposaurus jourdani found in Cerin, L'Ain, France (Jurassic, 157 - 152 mya)

 

 

Crocodilian found in Cerin, L'Ain, France (Jurassic, 157 - 152 mya)

 

 

 

 

Elosuchus cherifiensis found in the Kem Kem Beds of Morocca (Cretaceous, 95 mya)

 

 

Oceanosuchus boecensis

 

 

Araripesuchus found in Niger (Cretaceous)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Voay robustus skull found in Madagascar (Holocene) 

Crocodilus sivalensis osteoderms found in Tunesia (Miocene)

 

 

Diplocynodon

 

 

 

Egyptian mummified nile crocodiles

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Streptospondylus altdorfensis replica

 

 

Sauropods bone found in France (Jurassic, Kimmeridgian)

 

 

Pterosaur bones found in Vaches Noires, France

 

 

Dubreuillosaurus valesdunensis found in Conteville, France (Jurassic, Bathonian)

 

 

Theropod bones found in Vaches Noires

 

 

Theropod bones found in Vaches Noires

 

 

Dryosaurus bones found in Bléville, France (Jurassic, Kimmeridgian)

 

 

Sauropod vertebra found in Mondeville, France (Jurassic, Bathonian)

 

 

Lophostropheus found in Airel, Manche, France (Triassic, Rheatian)

 

 

Prosauropod femur found in La Pernelle, Manche, France (Triassic)

 

 

 

 

 

Dubreuillosaurus valesdunensis found in Conteville, France (Jurassic, Bathonian)

 

 

Dinosaur eggs found in Vitrolles, Bouches-du-Rhône, France (Cretaceous, Maastrichtian

 

 

We truly had an amazing trip and found some great fossils. But we also had a lot of fun with the people of our group, especially with the evening group dinners!  

 

 

Tomorrow I'll start to photograph my findings from the trip

[taj]

tsss .. another bunch of foreigners coming in to steal our beautiful , unique french fossils . Where is the police when we need them? 

<(black) humour inside >

< no humour inside : this is exactly the poster child for the scheduled ban on the VN , as seen from the powers that be >

Good for you! nice trip , excellent Normand weather and fine report , thanks !

 

[Manticocerasman]

Nice report Ken  

congrats with the fish fossil.

 

[ziggycardon]

So today I started to photograph and catalogue the finds. 

 

Let's start with our fish (Lepidotes) which we tried to free from the clay asap the day after our return.

 

 

Our 2 mystery finds, an orb with two long ends. 
My initial though was some sort of Echinoderm. A friend of ours believes it could be a Crinoïd with a parasitic infection. 
During prep a small piece broke of one of the ends which was pyritised.

 

 

One of the smaller finds which I believe could be a tooth fragment, perhaps even marine reptile.

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Some of the bivalves we found:

Myophorella clavellata

 

Myophorella sp.

 

 

Lopha gregaria multiplate

 

 

Multiple Lopha gregaria

 

 

Lopha gregaria

 

 

And lots and lots of Gryphaea

 

 

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Clamys sp.

 

 

Aequipecten fibrosa

 

 

Lopha marshii (still needs some cleaning up)

 

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Brachiopod (Galliennithyris galliennei)

 

 

Sponge

 

 

Crinoïd stem (poss. Millecrinus sp.)

 

 

Small pyritized ammonite (still have to check for the ID)
Perhaps a Quenstedtoceras or Kosmoceras sp.?

 

 

Cardioceras sp?

 

 

Some small Hibolites belemnites

[pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon]

3 hours ago, ziggycardon said:

So today I started to photograph and catalogue the finds. 

 

Let's start with our fish (Lepidotes) which we tried to free from the clay asap the day after our return.

 

 

That Lepidotes sp. is just amazing! I've been to VN twice now and the most impressive specimen I managed to bring back so far was a big hypsocormid fang. This way outclasses that find!

 

3 hours ago, ziggycardon said:

One of the smaller finds which I believe could be a tooth fragment, perhaps even marine reptile.

 

I hate to burst your bubble, but I don't think this is a marine reptile tooth. Not only have I found various smaller items at VN before that I initially thought could be teeth or parts of teeth, just to illustrate how deceptive some of the finds there can be, I also don't really recognize the right morphology in this fragment: it's not an ichthyosaur as the supposed enamel isn't folded; can't be metriorhynchid crocodile, as the enamel isn't smooth; isn't teleosaurian or plesiosaur either, because the striae just seem too irregular for that; and definitely isn't pliosaur, because the striations are not bold (triangular shaped) enough for that. I suspect, instead, this is a piece of either a shell or coral-like animal. I believe I found something similar a long time ago, but have forgotten the name. But, of course, it's hard to say for sure as the specimen is so small. Do you have other views of it just to rule things out?

[ziggycardon]

On 11/10/2022 at 11:12 PM, pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon said:

 

That Lepidotes sp. is just amazing! I've been to VN twice now and the most impressive specimen I managed to bring back so far was a big hypsocormid fang. This way outclasses that find!

 

 

I hate to burst your bubble, but I don't think this is a marine reptile tooth. Not only have I found various smaller items at VN before that I initially thought could be teeth or parts of teeth, just to illustrate how deceptive some of the finds there can be, I also don't really recognize the right morphology in this fragment: it's not an ichthyosaur as the supposed enamel isn't folded; can't be metriorhynchid crocodile, as the enamel isn't smooth; isn't teleosaurian or plesiosaur either, because the striae just seem too irregular for that; and definitely isn't pliosaur, because the striations are not bold (triangular shaped) enough for that. I suspect, instead, this is a piece of either a shell or coral-like animal. I believe I found something similar a long time ago, but have forgotten the name. But, of course, it's hard to say for sure as the specimen is so small. Do you have other views of it just to rule things out?

Yes we are very happy with the fish. We are very proud of it, our best find to date

 

As for the small fragment, I am not really sure what it is.
Does quite remind me of some kind of tooth but another thing that came to mind might be a small fragment of Hybodontid spine.  But could be indeed be some kind of bivalve.

I will make some more pictures of it in the coming days.

 

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Pyritized ammonite fragment

 

 

Brachiopods (Thurmannella thurmanni)

 

 

A Brachiopod?

 

 

Sea urchin spine

 

 

Procerithium sp.

 

 

Nuculoma sp.

 

 

Small bivalve

 

 

Serpulid worm tubes

 

 

Epiaster crassissimus found in the Cenomanian rocks

 

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Bathrotomaria

 

 

Oolithicia oxfordiensis

 

 

Oolithicia cf meriani

[Mart1980]

Very nice trip and great report. Thank you very much, enjoyed reading and viewing photos. 

[Everhardus]

Very nice finds and the museum is amazing. The area is very much on my “ to do” list…..