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Piney Point And Old Church Formations


Otodusobliquus

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I was wondering if any members on here could give me any information on these formations, as I am unable to find very much on the internet. These formations first interested me when I read the very little information in the appendices of Fossil Sharks of the Chesapeake Bay Region by Bretton W. Kent. The time period is one I have not hunted and contains teeth I didn't know could be found in Virginia such as Carcharocles auriculatus, Carcharocles angustidens, and Isurus praecursor. All i have been able to find on the internet is that they are only exposed above ground on the Pamunkey river. I was able to use this website to narrow that down farther.http://ngmdb.usgs.gov/lex-bin/search.pl

You select a state then the time period you want to search. It then shows a list of formations that match your search. Then you can click the formation you want and go to a page about it. In the upper right corner you click significant publications to get information about that formation. Pretty cool I think.

If anyone has hunted in these formations I would like to know what you thought of them and if you found anything of interest, thanks

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I have numerous teeth from the Aquia and Nanjemoy Formations but only two or three from the Piney Point - none at all from the Old Church. I was happy to get the Piney Point teeth in a trade maybe 20 years ago. I believe the Piney Point outcrops are rather unproductive relative to other sites so the average fossil collector is going to skip those. There's a similar situation in Bakersfield, CA. Collectors like the Sharktooth Hill Bonebed because you can find 40-50 teeth in half a day. Few look for outcrops of the Olcese Sand because you tend to find less than half that many in the same amount of time. The Olcese is a little older with a different mix of sharks. I was interested in that and a friend knew where to go so I ended up with a small collection of those teeth too. I hope you find good spots to hunt.

I would try contacting Bretton Kent. Also, there is a USGS office in Reston, VA. You should be able to find someone in the library (and/or the Map Sales office) who can help you.

I was wondering if any members on here could give me any information on these formations, as I am unable to find very much on the internet. These formations first interested me when I read the very little information in the appendices of Fossil Sharks of the Chesapeake Bay Region by Bretton W. Kent. The time period is one I have not hunted and contains teeth I didn't know could be found in Virginia such as Carcharocles auriculatus, Carcharocles angustidens, and Isurus praecursor. All i have been able to find on the internet is that they are only exposed above ground on the Pamunkey river. I was able to use this website to narrow that down farther.http://ngmdb.usgs.gov/lex-bin/search.pl

You select a state then the time period you want to search. It then shows a list of formations that match your search. Then you can click the formation you want and go to a page about it. In the upper right corner you click significant publications to get information about that formation. Pretty cool I think.

If anyone has hunted in these formations I would like to know what you thought of them and if you found anything of interest, thanks

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  • 2 months later...

If you have a small boat, there used to be a boat launch at Putney Mill on the Pamunkey, near Tunstall, not sure if it is currently open though. Upstream a few miles was the best outcrop of the Old Church that I found. The tooth preservation was great with an early Hemipristis & Isurus. We would slide a boat down the side of the Rte 360 bridge over the Pamunkey to get to the Piney Point sites. The Piney Point has big Abdounias along with the teeth you listed, and I think there was an early Hemi in there also if I remember correctly. And the Piney Point is real easy to distinguish too because it is a much lighter color than the underlying Woodstock. Buck Ward's USGS Professional Paper 1346 Stratigraphy & Characteristic Mollusks...has plenty of info on the strat, sites and Mollusks down there. Good luck if you go (with duck season coming in soon, might want to go on a Sunday)

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Exposures of both formations are rare above the water line. Keep in mind that all above-water exposures are on private property and digging is illegal without written permission from the property owner.

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