We all know of the famous fossil beds and coastal areas. These are obviously great places to find fossils of all ages. My question is this.
Can somebody find a fossil in a place like the foothills or piedmont of the Eastern US? Away from any large river or coastal zone. If so, what specimens could be found?
I donât think this forum is a very good fit for those questions about fossils. Wildlife and nature are the focus here.
Pretty much any sedimentary formation can have fossils. Just because it isnât near a river or coast now doesnât mean it wasnât submerged in the past. Mountains lead to sediment deposition, so there are sedimentary formations in those parts of the Eastern US. As for what fossils are there, I would just Google âregion/formation fossilsâ.
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Fossils used to be wildlifeâŚ
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Yes, agreed. Itâs just that iNaturalist focuses on living or recently living (100 years or less) organisms.
Just saying iNat not a very good fit for finding out about fossils.
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Isnât Nature Talk made for topics that arenât related to iNat? Fossils, although not part of iNaturalist, are part of Nature.
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Depends on what you mean by âawayâ from a river, and what sort of fossils youâre interested in.
Kentucky, my birthplace, is home to some darned big rivers⌠and some incredibly rich fossil beds. Youâre not going to find much in the way of classic, non-avian dinosaurs and their contemporaries; between sea ingressions, continental drift, erosion (at one time, the Appalachians were higher than the Rockies), and glacial scraping, deposits from the early Permian to the late Cretaceous are missing. On the other hand, there are Ordovician and Silurian rocks right at the surface in some spots. I used to have a collection of brachiopods, nautiloids, crinoids, and trilobites that I had picked up in creekbeds.
On the newer side, Kentucky is really where American vertebrate paleontology began. The site now known as Big Bone Lick provided the first specimens collected by Europeans in 1739. Those bones and teethânow known to be those of a Columbian Mammothâwere sent to the King of France, and are now in the Institut de France.
Now, if you want non-avian dinosaurs, come to Colorado. Weâve got Arthur Lakes and Othniel Marshâs original quarry sites practically in the backyard. (Okay; Morrisonâs about a half-hour drive from our house, but itâs worth the trip. The Morrison Natural History Museum is still pulling things out of those same rocks. (I help jacket an Apatosaurus rib section last week so that it could be safely removed from the matrix.) The first fossil footprint of a Dromeosaurid in Colorado was discovered at Dinosaur Ridge in 2016. And then, thereâs the Mastodon in the room, the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, which currently has an amazing exhibit detailing the recovery after the Big Rock rather abruptly ended the Cretaceous. Those fossils were discovered near Colorado Springs, and they include the earliest legumes ever found.
So, the short version is yes. You just have to narrow down what sorts of fossils you want to find, and go to where the right rocks are.
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Jumping on the âYepâ wagon. Found brachiopods and crinoids in NW Virginia, `400 Ma sandstone, at the top of a hill. We rummaged through debris from when the basement was dug.
The ROCKD app can give you information about what fossils have been found.
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