This weeks find

[neuropteris]

Hello all

Spent a pleasant Sunday pottering about on the beaches of Robin Hoods Bay (Yorkshire coast again) on Sunday and had quite a good haul - the stormy weather is back and stirring things up. Attached is the first to come out of the preparation laboratory (aka the cellar but laboratory sounds better!). Its an Androgynoceras sp(maculatum?) and proved to be quite easy to do - certainly the best I've found from 3 visits. Currently working on the other main find of the day - a big Amaltheus but will have to attach that one when finished. Find of the day goes to my mate John though - a near complete Jurassic Brittlestar!

All the best

Andy

 

[bobwonderbuns]

Wow!! Those are some remarkable specimens!!

 

[Phil]

Stunning Andy. I've got to come up to your area one of these days. Are those ammonites treated in some way, or is that the natural colour?

 

[erich orser]

What Phil asked...

Smashing "serpent stones"!

Incidentally, isn't that the part of the Yorkshire coast where one of the towns boasts a veritable warren of secret smugglers' tunnels?

 

[Architeuthoceras]

Nice find Andy! And many nice previous finds too.

Nice to have soft(?) rock and a sympathetic interface between fossil and rock

 

[neuropteris]

Unfortunatley I can't claim credit for some of the ones in the background - the only tool used in the finding and prepping of those was the credit card.

Robin Hoods Bay was indeed a smugglers paradise and featured in the recent BBC series 'Coast'. The area must have been very different 100 -300 years ago what with the smuggling and large scale alum and jet mining. Not nearly as desolate as it is today. RHB town is a great little place - a real warren of higgledy piggledy houses and lanes perched on a steep hillside.

The colour is just about natural Phil - I usually give the ones I do a thin coat of matt varnish (diluted in white spirit) or just warm them in the oven and brush on a little bees wax. It gives them a slight brown/yellow tinge but its hardly noticeably and helps to hide any dings or scratches which seem to stand out a mile otherwise.

Andy

 

[spartacus]

curlycephtastic Andy, I regularly kick myself (hard) that I never made the trip north having been besotted by Monmouth Beach that I may never seen again sniff, though have discovered Longeville-sur-mer here which appears to have good potential

Keef

 

[AndyS]

Good stuff there Andy, nice Androgynoceras maculatum.
Where's that good Oxynoticeras to the right of the Androg from ?

AndyS

 

[neuropteris]

Hi Andy

Its from Mike at Yorkshire Coast Fossils - way too good to be the product of my airpen. Originally found in RHB though the label said.

Andy

 

[neuropteris]

Here's the partially prepped Amaltheus found on the same day as the Androg. Still needs a bit of work doing on the nodule to make it presentable. Such a shame its damaged but its my first one so I'm still happy and it might be possible to do a bit of reconstruction to replace the missing bit. Will post another pic when its finished.

Andy

 

[AndyS]

Andy,

Must have been a good time to find brittlestars, here comes mine from about a week earlier, same location. It is nearly complete as well, Mike was so good to cut & stabilize it for me before transport back home.

AndyS

 

[neuropteris]

Wow what a beauty Lovely arms! Must put more effort into finding one of these.

 

[Phil]

Oh crikey, I'm sorry I missed these pics. I've been very busy over the last week and am trying to catch up here.

Both are absolutely fantastic fossils; that brittlestar is absolutely stunning and I imagine must be quite a rare fossil. What date would that be exactly?

Great prep job on the Amaltheus there Andy. How long did it take?

 

[neuropteris]

Hi Phil

The brittlestars and other asteroids aren't common at RHB (unless you're called AndyS ), but they do turn up. They're Pliensbachian (Middle Jurassic I think) - Andy can correct me if I'm wrong.

The Amaltheus took about 2 hours to get to that stage - the sea had already popped the middle for me and it was found lying there in all its glory. Just needs tidying up a bit so there's another 3 hours or so to go carving the nodule. Only other Ceph related acquisition recently has been a Haugia phillipsi found at Ravenscar earlier in the year which I've had professionally prepped by Mike at YCF - its a rare species from there so didn't want to mess it up by doing it myself. Came out very nicely (pic to follow when I get home).

Haven't been out to the coast since as I've been spending all my time looking for that 2m long Arthropleura nodule (inspired by Walking with Monsters!) but hope to get back to the Jurassic again soon.

Andy

 

[cthulhu77]

Fantastic...simply fantastic.