So this weekend was caving (of course) and found some really nice snailshell fossils...and then around the corner in another rock was a wholeeeee bunch of these, and I'm not sure what animal it is! It's not some weird anomaly, I counted 7 clear ones in the area, and some more that seemed the same just warped/smushed. Sorry guess I should have thrown my hand in for some scale...they varied slightly in size, but were about 3cm across (and although rounded, pretty square so about 3x3cm +/- .5cm or so)


Unknown Fossil 2 by Sunguramy [Amy Hinkle], on Flickr


Unknown Fossil by Sunguramy [Amy Hinkle], on Flickr

Looks vaguely vertebra like. Do you know the name and/or age of the limestone formation ? That would help constrain things.


Robin

Hi Amy. Your fossils are still gastropods (your "snailshells") which are sectioned vertically. If they landed all jumbled on the sea floor you would not expect them all to show a neat spiral. Those you first found were sectioned horizontally, so what you see is a spiral. If they are sectioned vertically you get an odd cross section through the spiral. It's even harder to figure out if it's oblique!

John B said:

Hi Amy. Your fossils are still gastropods (your "snailshells") which are sectioned vertically. If they landed all jumbled on the sea floor you would not expect them all to show a neat spiral. Those you first found were sectioned horizontally, so what you see is a spiral. If they are sectioned vertically you get an odd cross section through the spiral. It's even harder to figure out if it's oblique!

Click to expand...

Agreed - they'd be roughly this sort of shape I'd reckon - http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3340/5711168947_bb12348904_z.jpg

Ooo yes. So the three cavities are the same, getting larger as the spiral winds round.

Ooooh yes is see it now! Awesome, thanks!