JohnJ Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 I picked this up several years ago on a south Texas gravel bar. It's a cryto-crystalline imposter. It's hard to know the age of the original source material, but it could be as early as the Cretaceous. What do you think? The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true. - JJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bmorefossil Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 it looks like 10 things all at once, you have a ray plate some bone some crystals.... haha its the best fossil anyone can find, its an all in one, now only if they had ones of these for sharks teeth and you could find a sandhemimegkotiger Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaleoRon Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 I don't know what it is, but it's interesting and weird. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CreekCrawler Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 Nice rock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CreekCrawler Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 I know It's a prehistoric standing miniature Rib Roast!!!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tracer Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 it's a cast mold from a chelonian turritella palmoxylon. note how the vascular system of the flowem and xylophone don't interfere with the ventral ribation of the spinal whorls. this is characteristic of the subpeesee. next issue? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 Whatever it is, it functions as a 3-D paleo Rorschach. "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest N.AL.hunter Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 While I don't think it is a "turtle snail palm", I do not know what it is, but it is fascinating. My first thought was the innards of a deformed cehpalopod or some other type of coiled mollusk. Really neat. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbowden Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 It is a rudist fragment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tracer Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 dear mr. alabama hunter of the northern persuasion, sir - assigning common names to my scientific analyses of purported psuedomorphicsisms is bound to lead to confusion. i am a scientist of considerable renown in the area of study of chelonian turritella palmoxylonics, and it therefore pretty much a given that my pronouncements are infallible in that area. i note that northern abalama has an extreme paucity of such fossils, and therefore regard your surmisation of my erronicity as an intentional slight in an attempt to start an online tiff to distract all the available male fossil hunters from the new information that there's some eligible females prowling the posts now. this is beyond the pale, and the sort of thing you normally only expect to see inside the beltway. so my response must be to escalate. <bowing back; hissing; spitting; snarling> reowrrrr!! reowrrr! watch out! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbowden Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 It is a rutist fragment, common in the Great State of Texas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tracer Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 john - after intensive research, i have determined that the fragment you have is a chelonian turritella palmoxylon rudist, which in lay person's terms (although i don't recommend being a lay person around here with the atmosphere of late), is normally referred to as a <drumroll, puhlease> "squid beak". <doffing cap and echinoids> <snoopy dancing toward the exit, looking smug> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 john - after intensive research, i have determined that the fragment you have is a chelonian turritella palmoxylon rudist, which in lay person's terms (although i don't recommend being a lay person around here with the atmosphere of late), is normally referred to as a <drumroll, puhlease> "squid beak". Not possible! It's only 15 years old! (Which will get you 20 in MD) "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJ Posted February 22, 2009 Author Share Posted February 22, 2009 It is a rudist fragment. jp, that's the rudist comment about my fossil....but I'm trying to keep an open mind. Do you have a comparative example? Somebody has to help me out here, otherwise I'll have to go with dr. tracer's explanation. It reminded me of a filleted fish when I first found it; but I don't think it's a vertebrate fossil. What about some type of plant fossil? The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true. - JJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tracer Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 It reminded me of a filleted fish when I first found it; um, well then in addition to studyin' up on your fossils, you need to take a class on cleanin' fish, cuz yer doin' it wrong... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbowden Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 Any chance you found this at the Lake Georgetown spillway? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJ Posted February 23, 2009 Author Share Posted February 23, 2009 Any chance you found this at the Lake Georgetown spillway? It was recycled alluvial gravel in south central Texas. The chalcedony like nature of the rock leads me to think it probably originated in Cretaceous formations. The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true. - JJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbowden Posted February 23, 2009 Share Posted February 23, 2009 It's going to be Caprinuloidea palmer or Caprinuloidea planata both are from the Edmond formation and I will be in a nest of them tomorrow. They look like coral and are clams with growth chambers, their outside shell does not spiral like a gastropod, but goes straight more like a horn coral. The main chamber sometimes is found without the shell and because of it's growth lines is often taken for a straight ammonite. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnJ Posted February 24, 2009 Author Share Posted February 24, 2009 Pat, I think you may have nailed the ID. I found this link @ the Digimorph site: Caprinuloidea perfecta that displays a sliced view of this type of Rudist. The photos and text compare well with my fossil. I am very familiar with Durania (rudists) which exhibit a similar "cellular" exterior structure. Thank you for the ID; I never would have looked that direction. The human mind has the ability to believe anything is true. - JJ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jpbowden Posted February 24, 2009 Share Posted February 24, 2009 I have a ton of these guys and a little northwest of Blanco there is a large reef of a type 3 foot long, and some no more than a 1/4" long. What the heck were they thinking! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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