Into The Eocene Of Alabama

[Hawkeye]

Thank you Del for organizing this trip! It was great meeting Del, Holly, George, Margo, Jason and Brett. As Del stated in another post, it was HOT! My body and I don't get along very well in the very hot weather so I wasn't able to move as much dirt as the rest of those guys but it was a fantastic trip overall and really good company! It's good to know that the people you think you know online as just as nice in person as they seem online.

Again, my brain was tuned to fossils so I forgot to get pictures of the site. Hopefully somebody else will post pictures of the dig site. It was a very cool formation with multiple layers of teeth. The main layer was a green sandy mix on top of a mud layer. This shallow layer contained most of the teeth. Further up was a brownish layer of sand with scarce solid white teeth with black roots. These teeth were gorgeous but the root disintegrated on contact. Under the mud layer was about an inch of sand and then another mud layer. In between the two were very scarce brown teeth. It was hard work digging the packed sand out of the bank and I chopped through quite a few root lobes with my shovel. I did manage, with the help of my 14 year old, to pull out quite a few nice teeth.

Here are my 8 year old's teeth as he has them displayed. He's quite proud of them!

These are my better teeth.

I damaged the root on this ric when I was shoveling but I was able to put it back together.

This was another victim of my shovel. Thank goodnees for superglue.

I found a couple different species of nurse shark teeth, I believe these are Ginglymostoma and Nebrius.

I think these are Abdounia. I forgot to put a size reference but they are about 1/4 inch long.

If I got any of those genera names wrong please correct me, I'm just learning the names of the teeth.

Thanks again Del, and it was good to meet you other folks!

[Roz]

You have some very nice finds there. The smaller teeth remind me of AR river teeth.

They were always intact like yours.

I see that nurse shark tooth in the pic with 2 others. I know the lower one is nurse shark.

Are the other two from a different position in the jaw then?

[bmorefossil]

wow look at the ric!!!! sweeeeet! you sure its not some odd transitional tooth the cups are odd looking

[Hawkeye]

I see that nurse shark tooth in the pic with 2 others. I know the lower one is nurse shark.

Are the other two from a different position in the jaw then?

I think there are two different genera there. It was hard to photograph them because they are quite 3-D with projections coming out of both sides of the root. Plus they are only about 1/4 inch long.

[Coco]

I found a couple different species of nurse shark teeth, I believe these are Ginglymostoma and Nebrius.

As Roz, I think that the tooth down to the right is definitely a Gynglymostomatidae, but not the two other ones. I have just looked in the binocular at a jaw of Nebrius ferrugineus (recent shark), and all teeth are practically very similar on the jaw.

Coco

[Pristiformes]

As Roz, I think that the tooth down to the right is definitely a Gynglymostomatidae, but not the two other ones. I have just looked in the binocular at a jaw of Nebrius ferrugineus (recent shark), and all teeth are practically very similar on the jaw.

Coco

The gynglymostomid tooth I believe to be from Nebrius thielensis. The remaining teeth are not from that family. The tooth on the left appears to be a squatinid (angel shark), and of the genus Squantina although it is difficult to tell from the camera angle. I have no idea what species to attribute it to as most angel shark teeth (at least the modern ones) look very very similar to one another regardless of species.

The tooth on the top in the photo appears to be from an orectolobid (wobbegong), but again it is difficult to tell because, as you mentioned, it is so 3-D that a photo doesn't capture the morphology well. I don't pretend to know anything about fossil wobbegongs so I asked Gordon Hubbell to help me identify some teeth from that site last year and we decided they were either from the genus Orectolobus or Squatiscyllium (or perhaps a mix of the two genera).

Neat teeth!

[Hawkeye]

So I tried getting a better view with my scanner rather than my camera of the two tooth types. The first two pics are blurry because the scanner has no depth of field but you can see the three dimensionality of the tooth from two angles.

This is the other tooth which I agree is a Nebrius.

[Pristiformes]

So I tried getting a better view with my scanner rather than my camera of the two tooth types. The first two pics are blurry because the scanner has no depth of field but you can see the three dimensionality of the tooth from two angles.

This is the other tooth which I agree is a Nebrius.

The top photo looks to be Squatina. I'm still not sure about the third tooth from the original photo (the uppermost of the three specimens). If you could try scanning in that one I could see better what it might be.

[Hawkeye]

Thanks Jason. the third tooth (not scanned) is just like the first one but it is missing one of the projections from the cusp and the blade is shorter (worn maybe?). I see how it looks like a Sqatina. Unfortunately in the only book I have both of the Squatina are flat on the labial side but this tooth has projections on both the labial and lingual sides. Is there a Squatina like that? (I've got to get more books!)

[hybodus]

Thanks Jason. the third tooth (not scanned) is just like the first one but it is missing one of the projections from the cusp and the blade is shorter (worn maybe?). I see how it looks like a Sqatina. Unfortunately in the only book I have both of the Squatina are flat on the labial side but this tooth has projections on both the labial and lingual sides. Is there a Squatina like that? (I've got to get more books!)

Looks like Squatiscyllium sp., a Orectolobiforme shark fairly well known from that locality.

[Hawkeye]

Looks like Squatiscyllium sp., a Orectolobiforme shark fairly well known from that locality.

Thanks hybodus! I just did a Google image search and that is exactly what I have.

Here's another Nebrius that my son found

[Pristiformes]

Thanks hybodus! I just did a Google image search and that is exactly what I have.

Here's another Nebrius that my son found

Yes, I agree that it is a Squatiscyllium sp. if there is not projection from the lingual side of the cusp. They seem more common than Squatina in this formation. Last year I found 2.5 Squatiscyllium/Orectolobus teeth to every Squatina tooth found.

[siteseer]

The teeth of Squatiscyllium and Orectolobus appear to be identical. Squatiscyllium is the name given to teeth of that morphology from the Paleocene to Early Eocene. Orectolobus is the modern genus. David Ward was looking into the question of whether both names refer to the same animal some years ago but I don't know if he ever came to any conclusion about it. From that it could be said that your tooth is either from perhaps the most recently-known occurrence of Squatiscyllium or the earliest occurrence of Orectolobus. I have teeth like that from the Tallahatta Formation of Andalusia, Al that were labelled "Orectolobus."

Yes, I agree that it is a Squatiscyllium sp. if there is not projection from the lingual side of the cusp. They seem more common than Squatina in this formation. Last year I found 2.5 Squatiscyllium/Orectolobus teeth to every Squatina tooth found.

[Pristiformes]

The teeth of Squatiscyllium and Orectolobus appear to be identical. Squatiscyllium is the name given to teeth of that morphology from the Paleocene to Early Eocene. Orectolobus is the modern genus. David Ward was looking into the question of whether both names refer to the same animal some years ago but I don't know if he ever came to any conclusion about it. From that it could be said that your tooth is either from perhaps the most recently-known occurrence of Squatiscyllium or the earliest occurrence of Orectolobus. I have teeth like that from the Tallahatta Formation of Andalusia, Al that were labelled "Orectolobus."

It is a bit of a conundrum as to which genus to relate those teeth to. I had Gordon Hubbell look at my Alabama teeth and we couldn't decide which genus to attribute them, so I labeled them as Squatiscyllium/Orectolobus. There comes a point where its best to just move on and focus on other things.