Dinosaurs from Darwin

[SteveNT]

Dinosaurs from Darwin + pics

I promised Pythonmum I would post some pics of the fossils I find in Darwin Harbour. The mudstone reefs they are in are underwater most of the year but are exposed by the 7 meter + spring tides in our wet season.

They are mostly plesiosaur (loch ness monster) and icthyosaur (reptilian dolphin) vertebrae but I have found some XL vertebrae from pliosaurs also. Age is mid Cretaceous.

There is a lot of fossilised timber also and I have given several milk crates full to the local Museum. Hopefully a Phd student will try to reconstruct the Cretaceous flora of the Darwin region from all the material.




articulated icthyosaur vertebrae




plesiosaur vertebrae



fossilised wood



smaller plesiosaur vertebrae

After a cyclone all the weed, mud, coral etc is washed away and you can find almost complete animals exposed. They are too fragile to chisel out so I look for the ones that have weathered out naturally in the rubble heaps around the reef then soak in vinegar for a week (gets rid of any attached shells/ coral etc) and voila!

The museum gets first pick of my finds and they have a lot of my fossils.

Hope you like them!

 

[Wally]

Can't see any pics Steve.

 

[SteveNT]

Woops! Gotta go out, will fix it when I return! FIXED see above!

 

[Darlyn]

Wow they are amazing!
Very interesting pics thanks for sharing : )

 

[Wally]

Geez, not just your average fern leaf in a rock. Great finds!

 

[Renenet]

That is so cool.

 

[tropicbreeze]

That's great. I've never really associated Darwin with fossils (apart from some of those strange 2 legged ones, LOL). Inland there's lots of ancient sandstones that pre-date most obvious lifeforms that might have left traces. Not real fossil country.

 

[pythonmum]

Thanks Steve! That is great stuff. I didn't get time to knock around on the beaches, but wasn't the right tide to find any during my brief stay, anyway. My main souvenir was a skull from Crocodylus park. You really know you are in the NT when no one blinks at an Xray that shows a big croc skull in your carry-on luggage . I am writing it off on tax as an educational expense as I intend to use it in teaching. After all, I showed it to a few students.... Do you have any photos of the pyritised ammonites? I have seen a few and they are usually lovely, but I am pretty sure they had plastic brushed on quickly.

 

[snakes123]

I love fossilised wood

 

[Black.Rabbit]

That's awesome!! Thanks for sharing =)

What's the most amazing/interesting thing you have found?

 

[Darlyn]

I love fossilised wood

I live with a fossil, so I'm with you.

 

[snakes123]

haha, I like it since i learnt how it is made from a volcano and mudslides

 

[SteveNT]

That's awesome!! Thanks for sharing =)

What's the most amazing/interesting thing you have found?[/QUOTE

That's easy. My missus! (she's watching!)

But really, in fossil terms it's a split between some perfect 2.3 BILLION year old stromatolites (if they were green they would have been alive.) and a 4 armed Permian beastie that still has no home in the literature because it just doesnt fit.

But the joy for me is in the finding. I leave the tough jobs to the experts (unless they're not interested) Ever tried to get a beetle ID from a wasp specialist. Doesnt happen lol.

 

[pythonmum]

Is that 4-armed Permian creature an invertebrate? (I assume) It may sit in collections for a while before anyone figures it out. That happened with bits of Anomalocaris until people figured out that what they thought were 2 or 3 different organisms were actually parts of one big, nasty predator. If you don't know the right people to send the specimen or photos to, it may never get identified. The paleo world is really pretty small when you get to specialised areas.

 

[SteveNT]

Is that 4-armed Permian creature an invertebrate? (I assume) It may sit in collections for a while before anyone figures it out. That happened with bits of Anomalocaris until people figured out that what they thought were 2 or 3 different organisms were actually parts of one big, nasty predator. If you don't know the right people to send the specimen or photos to, it may never get identified. The paleo world is really pretty small when you get to specialised areas.

Spot on pythonmum. I carried one of the 4 specimens we found back to the car (with permission of the senior man for that area) and at 20kg on a hot day I doubt I could do it today. The palaeontologist for the time (Dirk Migarian RIP) posted photos to Permian experts worldwide. There were suggestions of a coral or maybe a sponge. But bottom line it's still a mystery. As far as I know.

 

[pythonmum]

An extinct mystery, too. Sounds like it was pretty darn big. I am absolutely no use with inverts. I tend to group them into Arthropods, worm-like things, corals and 'other'. It is enough to make an invertebrate biologist cringe . Mammals are a different story...

 

[SteveNT]

Sure are, the mammal like reptiles from the Permian may be found here, we have the rocks, but really there are so few people looking, let alone people who may have a clue what they're looking at.

Currently there are no dinosaurs in the Territory ( marine reptiles being not included) but I know where two are. In both cases they are of great cultural significance and realistically, I will never see them. One was described to me so well that I am sure it is an anklyosaur. And the geology backs that up.

Never mind, this place is huge, most rocks are exposed and I just keep looking! All things come to those.....

 

[waruikazi]

That is pretty awesome Steve! I've looked and looked but only ever found a prawn looking thing. I've heard Nightcliff is the place for the Ichthiosaurs.

 

[SteveNT]

That is pretty awesome Steve! I've looked and looked but only ever found a prawn looking thing. I've heard Nightcliff is the place for the Ichthiosaurs.

Lol they tell everyone Nightcliff to keep them away from the real location. I will pm you about where to look.

Where did you find the prawny thing?

That is pretty awesome Steve! I've looked and looked but only ever found a prawn looking thing. I've heard Nightcliff is the place for the Ichthiosaurs.

Now I think of it I know what you are talking about. The fossils are pretty common in mangrove areas and especially Gunn Point. They are a burrowing mud prawn that still exists in the mangroves, most of the fossils are aound 2-5,000 years old so very recent. I think they are called thassylinna or something like that.

There are beautiful pyritised ammonites at Gunn Point from the late Cretaceous (70mybp). They outcrop in mudstone on the shoreline.
There is a large monsoon forest gully nearby where the same formation should be exposed but last time I tried to get in I got chased out by a 6 pack of big pigs!

 

[waruikazi]

Gee you know your stuff Steve! It was Gunn Point where the prawn came from.

I figured that saying Nightcliff would have been a bit of a decoy, but when you've got nothing else to go on you need to follow every lead you've got!

Perhaps you need to go fossiling with Guzzo and his spear next time!