Fossils - Finds, purchases, collections

[DrP]

Anyone collect or interested in fossils? I find them and also buy them. If you have any then lets see them. I have more stuff, but here are some of the fossils from my collection. I might put more up if anyone wants to see them.

 

A few teeth, Some Trilobites.Some random fossils. Ichthyosaur.

 

And some Megalodon teeth, 4 to 5.5 inches or so.

[Endy0816]

That's an impressive collection there. Very nice. I'd definitely like to see more.

 

Bit juvenile but having a chunk of coprolite continues to provide me with amusement

 

 

 

How do you actually go about finding fossils? Are there dig sites, or do you simply go searchng?

[DrKrettin]

I have a fossilised fish (paleoperca) from the Messel Pit which is now about 47,000,040 years old. It is now closed to amateur fossil hunters

[Itoero]

I collected fossils and crystals when I was young...

I have many shell fossils, mostly out of the Apennine Mountains in Italy.

And I received a piece from a Mammoth tusk, from someone in Dawson city (Yukon).

Edited April 21, 2017 by Itoero

[StringJunky]

I think these are squid fossils:

 

 

 

[NimrodTheGoat]

I am also genuinely intrigued as to how one obtaisn fossils. Are there permits needed? Programs to enroll in? Perhaps rules of excavation are different in European countries then they are in the Americas.

 

 

P.S. I have been meaning to create a thread showcasing my rocks, but I always forget about it. My procrastination and laziness gets to me the majority of the time.

[DrP]

How do you actually go about finding fossils? Are there dig sites, or do you simply go searchng?

 

I went on holiday a while back to search for some and will probably go again. You can find them not too far from where I live also, mainly marine though. I bought most of mine though from shops and internet really. I've found a few interesting things though.

 

Bit juvenile but having a chunk of coprolite continues to provide me with amusement

 

I've got a few bits of coprolite too. One is full of fish remains and scales, probably from a big shark.

 

 

I have a fossilised fish (paleoperca) from the Messel Pit which is now about 47,000,040 years old. It is now closed to amateur fossil hunters

 

I have a nice lepidotes fish skull and a side flank in some rock. I was trying to get the skull out of the rock with an engraver, but it takes ages. I have other fish remains also. I might photograph them when I get round to it.

 

 

QUOTE: StringJunky: "I think these are squid fossils"

 

Belemnites maybe?

 

 

P.S. I have been meaning to create a thread showcasing my rocks, but I always forget about it. My procrastination and laziness gets to me the majority of the time.

 

Do it or just show them here? I've got some more I will get around to photographing and I'll stick them up here also.

Edited April 22, 2017 by DrP

[DrP]

Here is my lepidotes fish head. About 140 odd million years. It was part worked when I got it but have spent a good few hours with the engraver to slowly reveal more of the bone from the rock. It's from the UK.

 

Trying to post the pic of my Hadrosaur fetus. Says the file is too big. Not used to posting from my phone. Will have to sort it out later. It`s my favorite fossil.

Edited June 28, 2017 by DrP

[DrP]

 

Here is the Hadrosaur fetus and bone bits - 135 myo from Utah. Also a couple of pieces of Sauropod vertebrae from the UK and an Iguanodon claw and bone. Then an alligator jaw bone from South America, 3 to 5 myo. Then there is the box with the lepidoes head, it's flank and other fish bits up to 160 myo. Also some other fossils - ammonites, some trilobites and a segnesosaur dinosaur egg.

 

Edited June 29, 2017 by DrP

[NimrodTheGoat]

Nice collection, I love those dinosaurs in that second picture. I already uploaded my collection and have the pictures saved online. I had tried to create a thread some months ago, but I couldn't post pictures so I just gave up and never tried again.

Edited June 29, 2017 by NimrodTheGoat

[DrP]

I was struggling yesterday from my phone.... I sent them to my laptop and it was way easier from there.

 

I'd LOVE to get an MRI scan of that Hadrosaur fetus. If anyone one has access, thinks it would be cool and is willing to run the scan then please do let me know!

I love those dinosaurs in that second picture.

 

Yea - I have started putting stuff into boxes and adding pics and notes... I think it displays the fossils nicer.

[NimrodTheGoat]

 

Yea - I have started putting stuff into boxes and adding pics and notes... I think it displays the fossils nicer.

Yes it has a good vibe when you see plastic toy dinosaurs.

Anyways

 

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/uYVZlBJ90NVJdQVS5Rwel_NoDygNYXfu9e7GCQcgu-fxRtejphtXHJFy0XngZEDk1060g4-E73-6n5Y=w1366-h631-rw

 

They arent fossils but those were gifts from friends.

I can´t show the picture in the thread because " that extension is not allowed in this thread" or something like that.

Edited June 29, 2017 by NimrodTheGoat

[DrP]

link doesn't work either for me. says 403. lol - I can add it too my error collection.. not seen that one, usually 404.

Edited June 29, 2017 by DrP

[NimrodTheGoat]

How about now?

 

I call that rock Big Bertha cause its the biggest one I have. I found it in a river, like most of my rocks. A couple were found in the ocean, I will link those below.

Edited June 29, 2017 by NimrodTheGoat

[DrP]

yea, I can see that. Agates, crystals and a geode. I like the dark blue one.

Edited June 29, 2017 by DrP

[NimrodTheGoat]

This one interests me. Found it washed ashore on a beach. It is nice. It reflects light, like some kind of metal.

Edited June 29, 2017 by NimrodTheGoat

[zapatos]

I found this a while back. Looks like a shark tooth, but if I look hard enough I can probably see a dunce cap or a pink bunny. I really know nothing about fossils and only kept this because it looked interesting. Any idea if this is a fossil or just an interesting looking rock?

 

 

 

[DrP]

I found this a while back. Looks like a shark tooth, but if I look hard enough I can probably see a dunce cap or a pink bunny. I really know nothing about fossils and only kept this because it looked interesting. Any idea if this is a fossil or just an interesting looking rock?

 

 

 

I see where you are coming from about the tooth. Hard to say, if it is a shark tooth then it is in a bit of a mess compared to some that come out. Where did it come from? If you can place where you found it and identify the rock formation it was from then you can date it and give a better estimation as to what it might be. Are there a lot of sharks teeth found in that area for example?

[zapatos]

 

I see where you are coming from about the tooth. Hard to say, if it is a shark tooth then it is in a bit of a mess compared to some that come out. Where did it come from? If you can place where you found it and identify the rock formation it was from then you can date it and give a better estimation as to what it might be. Are there a lot of sharks teeth found in that area for example?

 

Thanks for the ideas. I'll look into it and see what I can find out.

[imatfaal]

I was struggling yesterday from my phone.... I sent them to my laptop and it was way easier from there.

 

I'd LOVE to get an MRI scan of that Hadrosaur fetus. If anyone one has access, thinks it would be cool and is willing to run the scan then please do let me know!

 

Yea - I have started putting stuff into boxes and adding pics and notes... I think it displays the fossils nicer.

 

MRI tends to work on the Hydrogen in water and fats within the body. I have no idea whether it would work on stone - it is possible that the variation in stone which we can easily see in fossils is not great enough to create a variation in the nuclear spin transition and relaxation which is picked up in an NMRI scan; on the other hand maybe it does work. Just in case someone approaches you with a chance to do a scan at a cost I would contact your local university's palaeontology dept. first. If you have already done this I would be fascinated to hear response. I know NMRI can be used on other nuclear spin models - but I thought they were specially made machines

 

Here is a link to a lecture I attended at the Royal Society - it is a few years ago and it all the info seem to have fled my head

https://royalsociety.org/science-events-and-lectures/2014/magnetic-resonance/

[DrP]

I found this a while back.

 

fossil.JPG

 

 

 

lol - check out what this guy is asking for what clearly isn't a toe.

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Fossilized-Toe-or-Toe-Shaped-Rock-/142426182953?hash=item2129431529:g:v3IAAOSwbtVZPaks

 

 

your rock looks like this one a bit.. doubt it is a toe though. need to know the find location and see what else has come from there.

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/FOSSILIZED-TURTLE-TOE-PAD-NORTH-FLORIDA-river-bone-collectible-reptile-fossil-/291802775861?hash=item43f0cd0135:g:PZ4AAOSwMNxXbqs-

Edited June 30, 2017 by DrP

[NimrodTheGoat]

$12,971.35 for a fossilized toe?

 

No thanks

 

LOL it's condition is listed as "Used".

[DrP]

 

MRI tends to work on the Hydrogen in water and fats within the body.

 

 

Yea, sorry, I think I meant CAT scans. There were eggs put through a CT scanner in a youtube vid I saw.

[DrP]

OK - I went to the dentist yesterday and had an x-ray.   I asked the dentist if she could x-ray my dinosaur egg for me....  she said she'd give it a go next time I am in (couple of weeks time).

This is very cool....  although I am worried the x-rays won't be powerful enough to penetrate the rock (I think these modern dentist x-ray machines use low power for safety)..  also - the size of the exposure plates are quite small  -   night have to take a couple of snaps at different places on the egg to see if there is anything in side.

.....  also, I just bought another dinosaur egg off of the internet. (Hadrosaur)  :-/  probably should have waited until payday...   I should make a nice profit on it if I can bring myself to sell it...  otherwise it can just sit my collection.   I got it for a good price. I think it would look nice in a box with the x-ray pic in it too (if it shows anything skeletal looking).  

 

 

 

[StringJunky]

34 minutes ago, DrP said:

OK - I went to the dentist yesterday and had an x-ray.   I asked the dentist if she could x-ray my dinosaur egg for me....  she said she'd give it a go next time I am in (couple of weeks time).

This is very cool....  although I am worried the x-rays won't be powerful enough to penetrate the rock (I think these modern dentist x-ray machines use low power for safety)..  also - the size of the exposure plates are quite small  -   night have to take a couple of snaps at different places on the egg to see if there is anything in side.

.....  also, I just bought another dinosaur egg off of the internet. (Hadrosaur)  :-/  probably should have waited until payday...   I should make a nice profit on it if I can bring myself to sell it...  otherwise it can just sit my collection.   I got it for a good price. I think it would look nice in a box with the x-ray pic in it too (if it shows anything skeletal looking).  

 

 

 

Let us know how it turns out. Don't hold out too much hope:

 

Quote

X rays[edit]

X-ray equipment, like CAT scans, are used to study the interior of fossil eggs. Unlike CAT scans, x-ray imaging condenses the entire interior of the egg into a single two-dimensional image rather than a series of images documenting the interior in three dimensions. X-ray imaging in the context of dinosaur research has generally been used to look for evidence of embryonic fossils contained inside the egg. However, as of Kenneth Carpenter's 1999 book Eggs, Nests, and Baby Dinosaurs, all putative embryos discovered using x-rays have been misidentifications. This is because the use of x-rays to find embryos is conceptually flawed. Embryo bones are incompletely developed and will generally lack their own mineral content, as such the only source of minerals for these bones is the sediment that fills the egg after burial. The fossilized bones will therefore have the same density as the sediment filling the interior of the egg which served as the source for their mineral content and will be poorly visible in an x-ray image. So far the only reliable method for examining embryonic fossils preserved in dinosaur eggs is to physically extract them through means such as acid dissolution.[67]  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinosaur_egg#X_rays