# Amateur Fossil Digging



## 2find4me (Jun 8, 2014)

Decided to gather some gear and go fossil hunting today. Never been before, but I had heard a lot of talk about the Apalachicola River Bluffs. Just bought a little river boat and got a Florida Fossil Permit, so I drove out to the bluffs. There were broken shells everywhere and so much ground to cover, so I gave up trying to dig. Just scanning the ground I found a few fossil bones, a few Indian pieces, and a big clam shell. I climbed to the top of one of the bluffs and found an ancient spring flowing down a sheer cliff. Can't wait to go back! BTW, does anyone have a fossil story to tell? Or can someone give me a few pointers? Here is the new boat:


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## 2find4me (Jun 8, 2014)

Here are the finds, maybe I can find a shark tooth next time.


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## bobble (Jun 8, 2014)

Hi 2find,not too sure where you're at but if ya find a place where they dredge for barge traffic,sometimes they get to prehistoric levels and maybe you can find a meg tooth in one of the piles.


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## DeepDown (Jun 8, 2014)

My Mom got remarried and moved to retired in Florida. So I went Venice Florida to visit her for a week and see her new house this last January. And she shown all the beaches around there. Ran into some people who was looking for shark teeth. They shown me exactly how they find them. Where to buy the metal basket (all the walmarts had them) So I did that for 3 days out there. That was actually really fun. The books are all over out there so can look up your teeth see what shark they came from and guess aprox how old they are. I found lots and lots of them. Was spending my whole days doing that. And the little shops around there buy them too & resale them to tourists. I didn;t sell mine, still have them. You also pull up lots of other fossils while doing it. And most the books make easy to indentify them.  Guy next me, doing it.. Found a old gold wedding ring. Old one.. But cheap one.. Made it even more exciting. Looking for big nice teeth and knowing you might even pull up gold in the process. After doing that... now I understand why Venice Florida Beaches is known as the shark Capital of the world... Or their sharks are harmless, toothless sharks... Because you find a lot of shark teeth there. From all kinds of sharks. -- I would not test my 2nd comment, they toothless.  It might be painful to find out that was my joke.. lol But I recommend to try that there. If in Florida.. You'll find tons of shark teeth. Fun figuring which shark they came from and how old. And then finding the Bigger and nicer ones.


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## RED Matthews (Jun 8, 2014)

Hello Deep Down,  My daughter was digging here in NY and found what she thinks were dinosaur eggs.?!! Didn't know but found them on the internet.  Her finds were big long egg shapes with one broken in half that had a dusty powder to it.  One is about 6-1/2" long X 2-1/2" dia. and the other is about 8" long x 3" dia.  We will be doing that study for a while.  When the girls were at home we went to a creek that is well know for them and found some brackiopods.ASs a kid and at my Grand Fathers farm we used to fine arrow heads. It was a battle area between Sullivans Army and the Seneca Indians.  Treasures are out there GOOD LUCK.  RED M.


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## DeepDown (Jun 9, 2014)

HI RED, That's very cool. Dinosaur eggs.-- I never found any Dinosaur Bones YET. But I'm in that part of Indiana where every year or 2, others seem to find them a lot... It Where the Ice age happened, near Lake Michigan.  Like 10 miles west of me (wolf Lake) I know they found many. And Last summer about 20 miles east of me.. someone digging holes for a fence stumble on 20 or 30 Dinosaurs/ bones, all complete. It all ways in the paper by me. Someone finding a big discovery of them. In past 5 years, they all been found pretty shallow. The people didn;t even dig deep... So everytime I dig out here.. I keep thinking... hmmm Maybe this time I will find a dinosaur. But no luck yet. There no question.. There Treasures in ground everywhere. I dug a few up myself. A Hop a long Cassidy radio. It rusted shell, but looked cool. Took a gamble & Tossed on ebay (thinking I get $5 or $10 since it Hop along Cassidy) and got $800 for it. Turns out it was really rare one. They bought to restore, really hard to find one. A friend of mine in NY adirondik mts area. He found an old mid 1800's marble when building his porch. Got a pretty penny for it... Between fossils & Just things in general... The ground holds lots of treasures.


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## TJSJHART (Jun 9, 2014)

my family moved back to mariemont ohio when my dad's dad past on . we lived there for a year then moved back to az. but in  that short time  i got hooked on digging up fossils in the streams  and hills in the area . that collection , i haven't added to it for 10 yrs. numbers over 200 pieces. but my acl collection is well over 250 . thats what hobbies will do to you .


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## 2find4me (Jun 9, 2014)

Thanks for all the replies, Robert that is a great idea, but they stopped dredge barges to a halt in 2005 on the Apalachicola River. Conservators said it was bad for the environment.


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## GEEMAN (Jun 9, 2014)

Check out the Peace River near Arcadia. I was visiting my dad near Clearwater last winter and booked a day trip with a guy who takes people out to sift the river gravel for fossils on the Peace River. Found a pile of shark teeth and a host of other fossil bones. Found a couple hundred shark teeth,pieces of turtle shell, antler,a barracuda tooth,an alligator tooth, a large fish vertebra even a sliver of mammoth tooth. Found several bone fragments from who knows what as well. So many in fact, that I stopped saving them. It was a lot of fun and pretty easy ... if you don't mind digging with a shovel most of the day.I would post pics if I could = computer idiot here unfortunately We would find a gravel bar then shovel the gravel into a screen and sift through it looking for whatever might show up. The screen was pretty simple- a 2x4 frame with quarter inch hardware screen attached to the frame. The frame had sections of those floaty pool noodle things zip tied to the sides so the screen floated. You attached a length of rope to the screen long enough to tie off to your waist so it wouldn't float away on you. Your boat would be more than adequate for the job. We used canoes. I will for sure do it again if I make it down there next winter. All you need is a boat/canoe, a long handled spade type shovel,a screen and one of those cheapo cloth nail pouches from Home Depot, Menards etc to put your finds in. I could easily become addicted to fossil hunting like that if I lived down there.


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## 2find4me (Jun 9, 2014)

Thanks Geeman, been wanting to go over there for sometime, waiting to see if my dad will take me. I made a homemade sifter with noodles for floats, almost identical to the one you described.It is a long six hour drive, but it is the summer and no school for me!  I have heard many stories about the Peace River just have to make the time. If I do go, I will be sure to bring my camera!


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## Robby Raccoon (Jun 16, 2014)

Oooh, I love fossils! All I have to say is to bring a couple buckets and a small set of tools--chisel, hammer, hand-held pick-axe, small shovel-- to split rocks. Look for sandstone, dolomite, and limestone with many layers and be sure to open any that seemed cracked. You tend to get an impression of the fossil on both sides of the rock. Be careful, of course, to not hit it too hard lest you shatter it to puzzle-pieces. Bring water to drink, too! Too many people get heat-stroke when they don't think it's even super hot. If you're looking for special pieces, then any animal--like large shells or insects or whatnot-- and leafy plants are in demand.


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## 2find4me (Jun 16, 2014)

This article has been brought to my attention, what do you guys think about it?http://www.tampabay.com/features/humaninterest/north-florida-arrowhead-sting-whats-the-point/2159379


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## Plumbata (Jun 16, 2014)

Very nice! When I lived in Maryland, I used to hunt the Chesapeake (and streams cutting through the Miocene to Cretaceous deposits), and found gobs of nifty fossils. Eyeballing alone can be very productive in little-known areas, but locations which are well-known require digging and sifting to find the goods. I never tried it, but I bet one could use a probe to search for buried zones of larger gravels/rocks, which would also hold respectable teeth and possibly a Megalodon or two. My favorite teeth were from the "Cow Shark": 
	

	
	
		
		

		
			





 and the "Snaggletooth" hemipristis shark:


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## CanadianBottles (Jun 22, 2014)

Spirit Bear said:
			
		

> If you're looking for special pieces, then any animal--like large shells or insects or whatnot-- and leafy plants are in demand.



Leafy plants are in demand, eh?  (Ha ha, wow I really am Canadian).  Back in my hometown I would wade across the river to an old mine tailing that had lots of leaf fossils all over the place.  I stopped bringing them back because I had so many.  Plus wading through a river with an armful of rocks isn't the easiest thing ever when the riverbed is all large slippery river rocks.  I'm sure there's still hundreds to be found if you do a bit of digging out there though, just a matter of transporting them back.


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## glass man (Jun 23, 2014)

My cousin lived in Colorado on an ARMY POST n 1969 or so..he dug p and found many many fossils there..he told me he put them all in a metal container and buried them..it would be great to go back there if we could ..find them with a metal detector!  Of course I doubt the ARMY BASE WOULD LET US ON WITH ONE!!


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## 2find4me (Jun 30, 2014)

Went back to the Big River again,and did some water skiing/knee boarding. After a while, I swam to a sand bar to look around few a few minutes before we left. Found mostly pottery, but all I looked was on the surface of the sand.


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## MuddyMO (Jul 27, 2014)

Florida is full of fossils, the most common being shark teeth, clams, horse teeth, and whale eardrums. Saber tooth tigers, giant sloths, and giant camels also roamed Florida. Perhaps also mammoths (i forget)? Warm mineral springs yielded some remarkable finds, including st the time, the oldest dated human being.

VenIce beach is full of sharks teeth, no joke on their claim to sharks tooth capital of the world! On the south end, there is the jetty (Intercoastal Waterway), and in the waterway out to the gulf, are typically flocks of hammerhead sharks. Scary! In this area, in the huge rocks and in the depths, the largest of the megalodon teeth are found. From experience, there's a million things in this area that will hurt you! Beware of urchins!

Indian pottery shards are frequently found on the top of the ground, usually by bays and low tide areas. Shell drills are a frequent find. Morally and legally, it is not allowed to pick up or disturb any of the mentioned. Having been around it, honestly, it's not even worth taking home! At Fort Desoto, it's not uncommon to see a plethora of artifacts and fossils alOngside each other.


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## Robby Raccoon (Jul 27, 2014)

Sounds  like Heaven for fossil-hunters.


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## sandchip (Jul 28, 2014)

2find4me said:
			
		

> This article has been brought to my attention, what do you guys think about it?http://www.tampabay.com/f...hats-the-point/2159379



Just what I was going to mention.  The powers that be in Florida have been quoted as wishing to end collecting altogether.  For now, as long as you are hunting for fossils, you're okay, but be caught with so much as a broken scraper on the rivers, you in a heap o' trouble.  FWC officers are out watching.  Y'all might also be interested in knowing that there are resolutions before the UN that also would outlaw the collecting of ANY antiquity worldwide.  Muddy is right, it ain't worth it, although I would disagree that it is morally wrong to pick up Indian artifacts.  99% of artifacts were tools used in everyday living and survival, not in ceremonies or burials.  It's no different from saying that after I'm dead and gone that my handsaw, utility knife and drill bits are sacred items.  And I might add, I do not condone violating burials in any manner.  Unfortunately, we all have been lumped by the media into the same category as looters, pothunters, and destroyers of our nation's history.  No joking, they put us in the same class as crackheads and metal thieves.


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## MuddyMO (Jul 28, 2014)

Morally wrong on preserves, monuments, state parks. These places were put in place to protect and preserve. But if you find these relics elsewhere, then yippee!

Agreed, most of us who will find and dig these relics have an interest in preserving history!


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## Robby Raccoon (Jul 28, 2014)

I've read the disputes between archaeologists, and people like those on this site. They both have strong arguments.


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## Plumbata (Jul 28, 2014)

The arguments from the freedom-hating leftists may _appear_ strong, but in reality are just specious justifications for their attacks against anyone who isn't an intolerably boring, mindless drone. Be very wary of the cultural Marxists. If left unchallenged, they won't stop until they've trampled upon all that you hold dear. They've already succeeded at intertwining the wholesale genocide of millions of Native Americans with the act of picking up an arrowhead in the minds of many. "White Guilt" is a very valuable weapon in the liberal arsenal, and it's lead to the implementation of many obnoxiously restrictive policies such as those involving even handling broken utilitarian artifacts in some states.


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## sandchip (Jul 28, 2014)

MuddyMO said:
			
		

> Morally wrong on preserves, monuments, state parks. These places were put in place to protect and preserve. But if you find these relics elsewhere, then yippee!
> 
> Agreed, most of us who will find and dig these relics have an interest in preserving history!



Oh, I agree.  Anybody is an idiot to try to remove items from those areas, but wait until your state declares that they own and control everything in state waterways, and declares everything in those waterways is _*in its original archaeological context,*_ then see how all you divers feel when you surface to face a game warden with an agenda.  Or worse, when they raid your house at 5 in the morning with a dozen officers armed with submachine guns, cleaning out your entire collection (not just the bottle or arrowhead that you found diving and sold to an undercover good ol' boy), pull your wife out of the shower and hold her hostage in her own house for a day,  take your computer, cell phone, camera, SD cards, etc.  And they will crawl through the attic and under the house to make sure they don't miss a shred of evidence to build their case against you.  And it won't be just a ticket and a fine, but more like a felony charge for each item that you rescued from being lost or destroyed forever.  Don't think it can't happen in your state.  All this has already happened in Georgia and Florida, wrecking the lives of some really good people. Oh yeah, they are supposed to catalog every item seized, and give a receipt.  HA!  Good luck on that one, and getting your collection back if you are acquitted.  "Oh, those items seem to have been misplaced."  Incidently, many of the officers collect artifacts too!


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