Please help identify.

[Lou7504]

Hunting on some rock banks today. Found what I think is an crinoid. Never seen any this big, the lines are zig zag and the color is darker than any I have found. Any help would be much appreciated.

 

[Ninjafossils]

Yep. Crinoid stem piece. Nice find

 

[GatorBoy]

Several segments together on that one... There's a place by me called the Peace River that people find a lot of those but they're usually one at a time.
I get a chuckle out of people calling them Indian beads.

 

[Lou7504]

Thanks guys. Is it rare to find one with the lines in a zigzag pattern. I have found so many of these but all have straight lines.

 

[GatorBoy]

I see the straight segment lines those zig zag lines look secondary to me.. In the photo anyway.
Kind of looks like a couple scratches on an angle across the other lines

 

[Harry Pristis]

I can't tell from the images whether this is a section of crinoid stem or a section of orthoceras endocast -- you could find both in TN (but neither in Florida's Peace River!).

If it were a crinoid stem, I would look for attachment points for cirri, small branches, on some segments. Also, I would look for a channel down the center of the stem.

 

[GatorBoy]

Peace River stem segments


You might want to research that a little further Harry.. Removing your exclamation point might be a good idea

 

[GatorBoy]

I've found over 50 of those in one day mostly in the southern end of Arcadia

 

[Perico]

I do have a section of the river where I've and other friends always find them. Always wondered about them. Crinoid or Indian bead theory. Not sure myself. Neat though!

 

[GatorBoy]

There's several online sites that identify them as crinoid stems and more than one fossil hunting guide that works on the Peace River says the same.
I don't think Indians were making beads connected together in segments.
During the time Megalodon swam over that area it was an estuary that should have been covered with plant and animal life

 

[Harry Pristis]

Sorry, guys . . . these are not even animal parts. The things found in the Peace River are fragments of silicified burrows of invertebrates. In other words, they are ichnofossils or trace fossils. The burrowers themselves are thought to be shrimp, like Callianassa, a mud shrimp or ghost shrimp.

Experienced collectors mostly know about these 'Indian beads' from the Peace River. A careful observer will note that there is no identifiable structure to the 'beads' . . . they are just hardened (silicified) mud. Furthermore, no crinoid remains are to be found in the Peace River. The heyday of crinoids was long over by the time Peace River sediments were laid down (survivors into the Cenozoic are a pale shadow)..

You can't believe everything you read in a 'fossil hunting guide,' or in any 'field guide' written by an amateur. Sometimes, the author just perpetuates the ignorance of other collectors. Gatorboy seems to have been led astray by this misinformation.

​

 

[GatorBoy]

I thank you for and appreciate your input however Harry I have examples with definite structural rings and separated segments.
Very uniform rings do not occur around a burrow.. There may be an explanation outside of crinoid but I do not believe it is a burrow

 

[GatorBoy]

Crinoids exist yet today.. Why would there not be at least one species at the time of these deposits?
"Sea lilly"

 

[GatorBoy]

Sorry I didn't mean to take this thread of track just can't imagine the exterior of a burrow being so consistently uniformly sized and shaped.. Having evenly spaced rings around the exterior giving the appearance of segments that just doesn't add up to me

 

[GatorBoy]

I'll leave it at that happy hunting guys.. Just trying to do my part in making sure there is no further spread of misinformation.


Harry I believe you are wonderful at being analytical that's a very good quality however sometimes I think it is at the expense of common sense.

 

[Harry Pristis]

I understand, gatorboy. You WANT these 'beads' to be crinoid stem segments. You BELIEVE them to be crinoid parts. Crinoid fits your conceptions of the world and of Florida fossils, in particular. Shrimp burrows (note the spelling) as an ID is counterintuitive. Therefore, they MUST be crinoid parts . . . even though there is no evidence to support that identification.

Understand that there are no surviving (Eocene and later) stemmed crinoids in Florida (the 'beads' would have to come from a stem). Stemmed crinoids that elsewhere survive are deep-water species that would not survive in the turbulent shallow-water bay that was Bone Valley just a relatively few million years ago.

Arguing against someone's beliefs is different in science than it is in say religion or politics. In science we can demand evidence. The evidence is just a few keystrokes away on Google. Do some research for yourself.

​

 

[mamabear]

Wow! Harry & GatorBoy? This is interesting. But I don't want to see my 2 favorite posters arguing. It would totally ruin my day.

 

[Ninjafossils]

#stoptheviolence

 

[GatorBoy]

Haha.. Okay my turn to demand the evidence.
Step to the plate Harry... prove there were no stemmed crinoids in bone Valley.
I have segmented evidence in my hand what have you shown?
It's a fact they survive today in deep water... And for your convenience you use those as a comparison to something possibly millions of years old.... That didn't just fly past me. Do you have any evidence that they did not or could not exist in that area during that timeframe? Every bit of evidence says the likelihood of that is almost nil.
Lack of evidence on your part does not constitute positive affirmation of your beliefs.
Let's see the proof

 

[GatorBoy]

I believe one good reason why a species of crinoid didn't or couldn't survive in that environment during that time would surfice.
I don't believe you could provide that.