Gallery
These photos are from my Instagram feed and get updated every week.
Soaking wet but very happy with this bone block I found! @paleo_craig and I braved the storm to see what was being washed up and found a few bits and pieces. Amazing colours in the bone, oranges and blacks and everything in between. It must have been from quite a large animal... whale, dolphin? Maybe even a seal. There's not all that much left but might be worth a bit of a prep.
Zoom and enhance! Here's quite an interesting fossil from a deep water Miocene area. It appears to be some plant material which resembles a conifer cone. You can make out what looks like some cell structure at 40x zoom, thanks to @paleo_craig for spotting it. The current theory is that there is a thin layer of carbon material left underneath some infill which has preserved the cell structure 🤩 This is the first potentially terrestrial plant material I have found at this site. Swipe to zoom out.
Progress on my fossil whale jigsaw puzzle 😆 its sitting at 250kg so far (550lbs) and it's still missing two parts that I can see. It contains the back part of a whale skull including the very diagnostic ear bones. It could help shed some light on the Mid Miocene whale species that were around New Zealand. I think I have 5 partial whale skulls in my garden now 🤣
A beautiful section of agatized bone I found on the beach yesterday. Possible something like a dolphin or whale. The bone has been replaced with minerals and perhaps something quite silica rich in this instance. It was glowing amongst all the bits of stone 🤩
And the winner of this cool little Pulalius crab is @seanylc 😀 thanks everyone for entering, I was blown away by the response! I'll have to do another giveaway soon! @seanylc I've sent you a DM to organize the shipping.
@paleo_craig spotted this concretion in amongst my collection and identified it as a huge amount of foraminifera (forams) 😯 They are tiny single cell creatures that live throughout the oceans and other bodies of water... I thought they were just tiny shells 😂 Forams can be used to get an idea of the age of an area which could be very useful as there isn't too much info available about the area where I found it.
A beautiful piece of fossil cetacean (probably whale) I found a couple of hours ago. The cancellous tissue (honeycombing) seems to have been filled with some type of mineral. It still has a bit of host rock attached to it. It's probably Miocene in age.
Fossil crab giveaway! 🦀🦀🦀 I'm giving this small Pulalius vulgaris crab away that I finished prepping last night, video will be out in 5 hours on my YouTube channel (link in my bio). To enter: 1. Tag two people in the post, both in the same comment 2. Like the post 3. Make sure you are following me on Instagram Enter as many times as you like but please only tag people that might enjoy posts about fossils 🦕🦖🦀 I'll draw the winner in a week by selecting a random comment and ship it to you free of charge.
Wasn't going for a ventral (bottom of the crab) prep but it's a bit of a gamble when nothing of the crab is visible 😄 this is a small Pulalius vulgaris from Washington state a friend sent me to prep. 🦀
Some close-ups of two of the bone blocks I carried back which looks to contain the back part of a whale skull. They were about 5 meters apart but look to fit together quite well. One of the blocks have the earbones still in position 😀 they weigh 102kg (220lbs) together, hopefully the other half of it is still out there somewhere 🤞
Big bone cluster I just had to get off the beach, one of three I had to carry up the big hill that day 😂 Nothing like a bit of Functional Fossil Fitness to get you moving 😀 This wasn't even the difficult part, I still had to roll it up a giant hill! Hopefully there is something good in there, judging by the amount of bones it could be 🤞 Check the video on my YouTube channel for the full experience 📽
A very tiny squaliform looking shark tooth I found in a concretion full of whale bones. Perhaps these small sharks were feeding on the whale carcass as it lay on the bottom of the ocean 🤔 Magnification is at 16x.
I thought I was into some bird or penguin bones but it had that fish look to it, that glassy appearance it always seems to have. It looks to be a hyoid arch from a tuna sized fish! Thanks to Canterbury Museum for the identification.
A cluster of very big shark vertebrae from today's hunt 🦈 these are the biggest non-basking shark verts I've seen from this site 😀 One day I'm going to find a tooth in one of these concretions!
3 big blocks of whale bones I managed to get home today, I'm exhausted! It took 4 hours to get these blocks up the hill, I had to roll one as it was too heavy to carry all the way. Two of the blocks contain definite skull material with an ear bone. The third is a bit of a mystery and I will have to investigate it a bit more, it must be close to 100kg 😁 The little red wagon needs some repairs as well, one bearing couldn't take the pressure and have up halfway down the beach.
Beautiful patterns on this crab "shoulder" that I am carefully exposing. Reminds me of a leopard or tiger shark 🐆 The crab was quite sticky on top of the carapace and it shows signs of some crushing and even two holes in the carapace that look very much like claw or tooth marks 🤔
Progress on my largest Tumidocarcinus giganteus prep yet. The concretion weighed 50lbs 😯 I'm hoping to have it done in the next two weeks still 🤞
I spent a amazing morning at @te_papa and even got to see where some of my fossils now live. You might recognize the fossil whale skull on the red trolley 😀 It was so educational seeing complete dolphin and whale skulls to try better and visualize the bones I find. Usually you can only see part of the bone sticking out of a concretion so it's really hard to imagine where it fits in the animal.
Chunky whale vertebrae I found in a tidal pool today, looks to be my biggest so far 🐳 It's from a late Miocene area where I've found quite a few cetacean bits and pieces.
Leg day at the fossil gym today, 120kg (260lbs) of rock retrieved today. A block of whale skull elements including ear bones and one mystery block 🤔 Good thing I strengthened the little red wagon 😂