I took off yesterday morning an drove to a central Texas creek to fossil hunt. This is not the same spot I visited last week; it’s a creek I hunted in September of last year. It is also Wolfe City formation. I’d hunted a gravel bar briefly in that last trip, but had found all the teeth I brought home in outcrops on creek walls afterward. Considering how many teeth I found in those outcrops, I planned on hunting the gravel bars below them better this time.

I first made the hike to the outcrops. I had found all the teeth on my previous trip in a narrow part of the outcrop just above the water level, and had noted to myself that lower water levels would be a better time to hunt this area. I thought that yesterday would provide those conditions, but it didn’t. Not only was the water level not lower, but the bank just below the part of the outcrop I needed to hunt was very muddy, making it tough to maintain footing while hunting. In addition to that, weeds and brush up against the outcrops had gotten so thick that I wasn’t able to hunt a couple of the previously productive spots at all.

But I did find some teeth in the outcrops. Here are some in situ photos.

This creek has had a lot of cattle traffic in the past year. There wasn’t much doubt of this once I left the outcrops and walked down to the gravel bars below them. The wetter gravel bars had been trampled to the point that there was no longer any visible gravel, just mud. And even the drier gravel bars were trampled, and had weeds growing everywhere. Here is the one where I finally managed to find a few teeth.

Teeth were very tough to spot on this gravel bar under these conditions, but I did manage to find a few. Both of these teeth are hard to see, even in the photos, especially the very small tooth in the first photo (hint: it’s perched nicely on top of the rocks, just left of the glove thumb).

Hamulus worm tubes, on the other hand, were plentiful, and I picked up quite a few of them. Here is what I brought home.

This tooth from the first in situ photo is my favorite from the day. Scapanorhynchus texanus?

Some other individual photos of the teeth. Several of the smaller ones were the most intact.

I took off this morning and made a drive to central Texas to explore a new creek. This part of the creek is Wolfe City formation. I had hunted another Wolfe City spot not too many miles from this one, but wasn’t sure what to expect. I had found mostly teeth at the other spot, so after making a pretty long hike to get to the best looking outcrop in this creek, I searched the outcrop itself, without finding anything other than shell fragments. So I put on my knee pads, and started searching the gravel bar (more of a mud bar, really; this creek is pretty muddy) nearby. The only things I spotted on the gravel bar were a couple of exogyra ponderosa oysters. I didn’t pick them up. They are heavy to carry, plus I already have a good collection of nice ones from my early NSR trips. I was pretty disappointed, since this was the best looking outcrop in the creek. But I’ve learned that where there are exogyra ponderosa oysters, there are usually other fossils nearby. So, I started my trek back up the creek with the intention of checking the gravel bars closely.

Sure enough, on the very next gravel bar, I spotted this.

I was pretty surprised, since I had mainly just found teeth at my only other Wolfe City spot in this part of the state. I was on knee pads when I spotted that vert, but hadn’t found any small fossils at all, so I stood up and spent the rest of my time on my feet, looking for bigger stuff. Sure enough, less than five minutes later on the same gravel bar, I spotted this.

And that was it. The rest of the hike back, I found nothing but more exogyra ponderosa oysters. So I didn’t bring much home, but any time I find mosasaur verts, I’m going to consider that a good trip. Here is a better look at that first smaller one.

And here are four views of that second vert. I think it’s a beauty.