I had a job in Dallas this morning (retirement still hasn’t quite taken), but finished very early, so I decided to stop by a spot that was on my list, that was only five miles or so from where I was working. Wearing jeans and a work shirt, and with a forecast high of 99 degrees today, I knew I wouldn’t be staying long, but I was close to the spot, and it wasn’t nearly as long a hike from where I’d park as I usually end up with, so I figured I’d take a look.

This is an Eagle Ford outcrop. It’s in the middle of DFW, so not exactly secret and off the beaten path, so I wasn’t sure if I would find anything or not. I spent an hour checking the outcrop and nearby gravel bars, then headed for home. If I’m identifying this piece correctly, it’s a burrow with a small ammonite fragment attached. Not too exotic, but it was so cool looking, I had to take it home. It almost looks like a cow skull with a small crown. Click the photos to be able to zoom in and get a closer look.

Then there was this larger ammonite half. It looks like a Placenticeras Cumminsi. It’s in pretty rough shape, but the shell is very much there, albeit with lots of cracks. I don’t seem to find many ammonites with the shell so obvious as this one.

Here are a couple of smaller ammonite fragments, with some shell fragments underneath. The two shell fragments on the right also appear to be from ammonites. The one on the left appears to be from a bivalve or oyster. I don’t know what the second from the left is, but it has the same color and texture as the Placenticeras Cumminsi ammonite.

This gastropod and these oysters appear to have come from the sand above the Eagle Ford outcrop rather than the outcrop itself, although the bottom two do have the same blue-gray color as the outcrop.