Fossils are SEXY

     I've been trying to convince people for a couple of years now that fossils are sexy but I never really knew how to get the message across.

Until now.

     I came across this photo while researching dolphin earbones.  I like things that make me think and this artist's work really made me think about my fossils.  I'm getting some ideas for my personalized Christmas card!  (Be not afraid!  I will hire a body double, lol!)

     My day to dig is Friday.  Always.  But last week encompassed spring break and due to visits from out-of-town guests, I switched to Saturday.

     And I liked it.

     I had myself all worked up to believing that weekends sucked because, heaven forbid, I might see other people on the river, but it was nice.  Everybody that floated past was happy, and the Orlando traffic was a breeze, and there were no more paying groups with guides than I see on Fridays.  Logistically, Friday is still the best day but I won't rule out weekends when availability crops up.

     Last week also encompassed my birthday and one of my dearest friends sent me this surprise from the great midwest:

     My very own GoPro!!!  The box is emblazoned with the slogan "Be a Hero" and I'm letting you all know that won't be happening, but I plan on having some serious fun with this.  Too bad I can't figure out how to post video to my blog.

Baby steps...

     So, as usual, I was cruising through WalMart, looking for a fight, and I saw a fabulous shovel head that would be perfect on my $25 Kobalt mortar hoe handle.  

This shovel comes with a built in step to make it easier to dig holes and you might think that would be the attraction for me but the real reason I wanted it is that the built in step helps keeps everything from sliding off the back of the shovel head as I'm transferring it to my floating strainer.  Easy!

...not...

     I took the raw materials to Mike's house and told him I needed "X" shovel head transferred to "Y" handle and could he please weld the finished product while he was at it and that's when it got crazy.  He couldn't get the head off the shovel and was bending the built in step all to hell and back with a 10 lb sledge hammer and kept going at it with a grinder and I was getting more and more agitated and hovering until he missed with the sledge and took out his finger instead.  That was a bad moment.  I waited a full 24 hours before asking him if he could finish the welding on the shovel.

     After all that, my new long handle shovel is fabulous!  The photo was taken after ONE DAY in the river.  I'm rough on my gear.

     It may seem anti-climatic to post pics of the fossils I found Saturday but I'm going to do it anyway.

     Here are the aforementioned dolphin ear bones.  The top 3 are called bullas and the bottom 3 are periodics.  I assume they perform different functions within a dolphin's ear but as you already know, I got distracted during my research.

     These are fossilized fish mouth plates.  Not perfect but the form is so distinctive and eye-catching, they always stand out in a sieve full of gravel.

     And here's the haul for the day.  Not too shabby!  Another tapir cap (I must be on a tapir cap kick), a sweet mako blade and some decent little megs, loads of small teeth, turtle scutes, etc., and a worn canine that I am still attempting to ID. 

     Counting down the days til my next dig!

Orange blossom season

     This is a wonderful time of year to be in the river because all the orange groves in this largely agricultural area are in bloom and the smell is amazing!  Much better than the smell of the dead cow we dug next to last season.
     The only constant thorn in my side is the cost of filling my gas tank for the 4 hour round trip every week.

Ouch!

    And I drive a very small pickup truck.  At least the rest of the hobby is inexpensive.  

     I am trying to capture the mural painted on a grocery store in Wauchula but there are always trucks parked in front of it so I will share it in segments.

Part 1

     So I had an amazing day on Friday and it was made possible by friends who shared knowledge and experience and access to an otherwise difficult to reach part of the river.  I am serious when I say, "I would be nothing without them."  I did have to paddle in a canoe and I think I've made my feelings regarding paddling abundantly clear, but it was a small price to pay for a stellar day.

     We got to the area where the guys were going to dig in holes they had already started.  Hmmm....Where to dig?  Since they had previous success, I moved a little downstream and tried to imagine the line of gravel they were working.  It seems funny now that Steve kept telling me to go to another area and I know he was doing it to improve my chances of finding good fossils but as usual, I stubbornly stuck to my guns and got to work in my chosen spot.

And it really paid off...

A baby mammoth tooth!

     It's so tiny and perfect and even has some of the root.  Hard to believe how big the teeth were in adults by comparison.

     That is my hand on an adult mammoth tooth; not one that I found as I have yet to find anything that big, but I'm cleaning up on the little stuff!

     

     I also upped my meg game by finding my NEW best river meg to date.  This one measures 2" on the diagonal and has almost perfect serrations all the way around.  Two perfect tapir caps exactly doubles my collection of tapir caps (being a newbie, I only had 2 in the fossil cabinet).  There is also a lower mako in the above photo but its root is damaged.

     I could have ended my day right then and there but I aspire to be a human excavator so I kept digging gravel and had a full bucket of goodies for the first time this season.

     Variety is the spice of life and my Friday was plenty spicy.  Glyptodon scutes, turtle puzzle pieces, TWO horse incisors (one with most of the root) as well as other horse, deer, and camelid teeth, loads of various armadillo scutes, garfish scales, a tiny toe bone (not sure which animal it came from), tortoise spurs and foot pads...

     ...and lots of other goodies including loads of smaller shark teeth.

     What a banner day!  I don't know when the opportunity to return to that area will arise again but I'll jump at the chance if it comes.

      The perfect day was rounded off by the discovery of the last 2 bottles of $5 clearanced (but excellent) wine, languishing on the bottom shelf of a rack at the Wauchula WalMart.

      No complaints.

Dig deep

     After a week off due to house guests, I was anxious to get back to the peace of the river.  I lent my spare kayak to a fellow club member and we started paddling (or motoring in my case) about 7:15 AM.  I followed him to an area where he had been finding some good megs in deeper water.

     He kept calling me over to dig in a fissure he had discovered a few days earlier.

     I, of course, stubbornly poked around in shallow areas with nil results.  Finally I conceded and waded over to see what he was doing.  What he had uncovered was a long, deep, twisting crack through the bedrock of the river.  Very interesting!  BUT it was too deep for my regular shovel and for some reason, I was having trouble in the narrow space with my long handle shovel.  My mind kept drifting to thoughts of expensive fossil scoops...

   

 I kept digging...

Near miss!

Fail!

Success!

     I found it interesting that we separately described our day to a fellow fossiler and I was the "glass half empty" person while my digging partner was the "glass half full".  I'll work on my attitude. :-)

     I go to sleep each night thinking about where I will dig the next time I go to the Peace River and I keep thinking about the BIG rocks I found a few weeks back.

     Look at those suckers!  Why, oh why, isn't one of them a mammoth tooth?!

Maybe it's still there...

     On the homefront, I finally fixed up the curio cabinet a client gave me for my fossils.  It needed some new shelves and a door replaced.  I spent 3 mornings transferring and arranging my fossils.

Not a job for the over-caffeinated!