water hunt and beach finds fossils??????

[xmarks73]

Here are a few fossil looking items that I have found water hunting and a couple that my son has found on the beach here in Michigan. Can anybody tell me anything about, any of them? Thanks in advance.

[Harry Pristis]

Of the five fossils in a circle:
12PM --- spiriferid brachiopod
2PM --- unknown
4PM --- unknown (perhap a chip of a solitary ["horn"] coral)
6PM --- unknown (perhaps a fragment of a colonial coral)
9PM --- spiriferid brachiopod
Outside the circle --- looks like a rock.

[xmarks73]

The last two pictures are corals. I have all sorts of them . Can't tell you what kind, my fossil book is walkabout. Michigan used to be a sea. I can't remember how many hundred thousands of years ago. Good book: Geology of Michigan by John Dorr.

Side note: Michigan used to be the home of seven foot beavers. Yes, 7 feet. I have always found that to be a fascinating, yet scary fact. They used to display some giant beaver fossils in Lansing at the natural history museum. Don't know if they do anymore though.

Thats a big beaver! gonna have to search that out. pretty cool fact. ty for the id's

[Harry Pristis]

Your fossils are Paleozoic certainly . . . not hundreds of thousands of years old, but hundreds of millions of years old. They were excavated in Canada and dragged down to the northern parts of the USA by glaciers.

In contrast, giant beavers, Castoroides ohioensis, is a Late Pleistocene species. These are dated in the thousands or tens of thousands of years.

[Harry Pristis]

I didn't mean the fossils were hundreds of thousand years old, I meant the last time Michigan was covered by an inland sea.

Sorry, 'jade', Michigan has not been covered by an inland sea since Paleozoic times -- again, hundreds of millions of years ago.

[xmarks73]

A huge thanks to both Harry and Jade. I do not know anything about fossils. I really enjoy finding them though! Thanks for the ID.