Author Archives: Bud Baker

East Texas creek, September 2nd

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I made a fossil hunting trip to a creek in East Texas yesterday and brought home a nice collection of very small teeth. It was the first time I’ve ever had success finding fossils less than an hour drive from home, and I was pretty pleased about that. This was a Kincaid Formation outcrop. The teeth came from a shell hash that was on top of some very hard limestone. Some of the matrix which contained the teeth was the same gray as the limestone, and some of it was a tan color.

I looked at a lot of identical looking matrix which had nothing but shell fragments in it, but once I found teeth, there were more teeth nearby. I had to chisel into the matrix to find teeth, so as I searched for teeth, I just kept tossing matrix pieces into my backpack to take home. So now I have a bunch of matrix to go through. I’m looking forward to doing that in my air conditioned house rather than outside in yesterday’s 98 degree temperatures. LOL. I made an early day of it after it got so hot, heading home before 1:00 in the afternoon. I’ll update this post after I’ve gone through all the matrix.

Here are some matrix pieces I brought home. The upper two are the same gray as the limestone they were on top of. But there was also some tan matrix mixed in, like those two bottom pieces. Both had teeth in them. Click the photos to be able to zoom in and get a closer look.

Two teeth in the matrix on this rock. The top one was still attached to the matrix, but the bottom one was loose inside a hole that it looked like someone chiseled. So much for my secret spot.

Some of the matrix I brought home had teeth that weren’t too hard to spot.

Here are the 20 teeth I’ve found so far. I’m going to have to do some research to identify some of them. The Kincaid Formation and Paleocene period are both new to me. The surprise of the day was a single small Ptychodus tooth I found. Since Kincaid is 66 to 56 mya, and Ptychodus supposedly went extinct 85 mya, I didn’t expect to see any today. But this one was in the same matrix the other teeth came from. It appears I found a tooth from one of the last of the Mohicans. It didn’t take too long after I posted about this in The Fossil Forum yesterday for someone to suggest that I had likely found the Ptychodus tooth elsewhere and accidentally mixed it in with yesterday’s teeth, but I don’t think so. I have collected no other matrix that breaks apart as easily as this, and I broke the Ptychodus tooth out of a piece of matrix after I got home. It will be interesting to see if I find any other Ptychodus teeth in the rest of the matrix.

If I thought last week’s teeth were small, then these teeth are REALLY small. But I had a blast finding them.

And I have lots more matrix to go through. I’ll check back and update this post after I’ve been through it. Thankfully, it’s nowhere near as hard as most matrix I seem to bring home.

09/03/21 Update: I’ve made it through quite a bit of the matrix. As advertised for Kincaid, this matrix has lots of micro teeth. Between my new prescription eyeglasses and my magnifying lamp I bought, I can see them much better than I ever would have been able to before. So I’m researching the care and feeding of microfossils. I have ordered a digital microscope. Hopefully when it arrives, I’ll be able to post some decent photos of these teeth. I’m beginning to see the attraction of microfossils. What looks like nothing more than a speck to the naked eye is a beautiful tooth under that magnifying lamp.

09/04/21 Update: I’ve gotten in my digital microscope and started taking photos of the teeth. Here is one of the smallest, no more than a speck to the naked eye.

And here is one that reminds me of how many are broken and how many need to be cleaned up. I guess I need to research cleaning recommendations for teeth this small. And I need a new ruler, without so many scratches, no doubt.

09/05/21 Update: I made a cleaning solution of water, hydrogen peroxide, and Calgon and soaked the teeth for an hour. Here is that same tooth afterward. Guess it’s time to make myself a gallery.

August rides

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I took off on the F-5 this morning and rode out to Big Rock Road. But I didn’t just come back the same route. Just as I got back into Mabank, I split off and rode CR4001 to FM3080, and then a couple of miles east on FM3080 before turning around. That gives me 40 miles. I’m still doing mostly 30 mile rides, but I’ve started throwing in one 40 mile ride each week to give me 100 miles each week.

I ended up with 12 rides for 390 miles on the bike in August. That’s the most miles I’ve done in a month this year. And I once again finished the month with no medical drama, so I’m continuing my march toward regaining fitness.

Today’s route.

Hill County creek, August 26th

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I made a trip to a new creek in Hill County last Thursday. This is another Eagle Ford formation creek, though it is very close to Austin Chalk coverage. It was another creek that’s tough to hike in places. Even with my new, first time ever, prescription glasses on, I didn’t find a whole lot, but I did bring home a few interesting pieces.

Here are opposite direction views of the same outcrop in the creek. It has the blue gray clay you find so often in Eagle Ford outcrops. Click the photos to be able to zoom in and get a closer look.

Here’s my friend I met in the creek. I let this big guy swim on by before I waded across.

There were lots and lots of small ammonite imprints in rocks, like the one in the upper left part of this rock, but no surviving ammonite fossils that I found.

And there were lots and lots of shell fragments in rocks. These were bigger than most.

This rock looks like just another of those with lots of shell fragments.

But this side view of the same rock shows a hidden jewel I almost missed. That’s a Ptychodus tooth.

Shark teeth were few and far between in the creek, but here are a couple of pretty ones, though small, still in the matrix.

As I get more experience at fossil hunting, I’ve gotten better about not just picking up everything neat looking that I find. But I couldn’t resist this, one of the larger bison teeth I’ve run across.

There were lots of hard to identify fossils in the rocks. That looks like some kind of tooth on the left, but I have no idea what the others are. They all look too delicate to remove from the matrix, but I may do a bit of pick work to try and tell better what they are.

And finally, this bone. The first photo shows a view of each side of it. There is still a bit of rock attached. I didn’t remove any matrix from it; this is just the way I found it. The last photo shows a side view. I’ve posted these photos in The Fossil Forum. I’m hoping someone there can identify it.

July mileage and other musings

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I managed to make it through July with no health setback. Considering recent events, I’m considering that a big win. I ended up riding 325 miles in July. And there I am, talking about miles again. Tracking mileage, and working to make mileage goals, is a great way to keep yourself motivated to keep turning those pedals. But I’ve gotten some very strong reminders this month that mileage isn’t the most important thing to consider about my riding.

When I moved to Gun Barrel City in 2013, I had been riding over 7,000 miles a year (that’s averaging over 140 miles a week) for several years. With that move and my change in jobs, I knew that my mileage would have to become less. My lifestyle no longer allowed for that much riding. I also knew that, living out here in BFE, there would be few organized rides in my future; it would mostly be just solo rides. I settled on 100 miles a week as a realistic goal. At my 15 mph average on the bike, that would be 7 hours a week of riding. 7 hours a week is seen by many as the gold standard goal for aerobic exercise. And studies had shown that if your heart has diastolic dysfunction (which mine does), 400 minutes a week (just under 7 hours) of aerobic exercise was the amount that showed the best gains and maintenance for that condition. So 100 miles a week became my new goal.

But I knew all along that the day would come when I could no longer average 15 mph on the bike. Much sooner than I expected, that day has arrived. I’m still making improvements in my speed since I’ve gotten back on the bike, but the gains are very gradual now, and I have doubts that I’ll ever reach that 15 mph average again. I’m currently averaging just under 14 mph on the bike. With that average, 90 miles a week gets me the 7 hours of riding I think I need. Last month, I had ridden 100 miles three weeks in a row when I suddenly had unexplained pneumonia. I was forced to consider the possibility that I was overdoing it with my attempt at getting fit again. So for this month, I cut back to 90 miles a week. I’ve just been doing three 30 mile rides a week. If I do get faster on the bike again, I could always increase my mileage goal again.

But then another mileage complication came along. Two weeks ago, after completing my three rides for the week, I went fossil hunting, hiking along two new creeks. Both creeks were especially difficult hiking, and I realized when I got home that I had gotten as much of a workout from that hiking as I do from a 30 mile bike ride, if not more. And I was feeling like I had overdone it that week. So, from now on, any difficult fossil hunting hikes I make will be taken into consideration for my aerobic exercise hours that week. That’s another hit to my mileage goals. So, I’m thinking it’s time to move on from mileage goals. I need to do my best to get my seven hours of aerobic exercise every week that I can, and call it good.

And speaking of fossil hunting, I have added that to my blog. When I started this blog, I did it retroactively, putting together posts from a couple of years of posts in two cycling forums and a lung cancer support forum, and changing the blog dates on those posts to back when I had first posted them in the forums. I’m doing the same thing with my fossil hunting. I started fossil hunting in April of last year. I had taken a month off work at a time when so much was shut down because of COVID, and I was already working enough less hours that I decided it was time to add this hobby I had been fascinated with for many years. Up to now, the fossil hunting posts in this blog have been taken from posts I made in The Fossil Forum, and dated with the dates I posted them there. From now on, I will make separate posts here. I may make some posts here on days when I didn’t find anything of enough significance to bother posting in The Fossil Forum. And if I post in both, I’ll likely make the post here less technical. It’s a great hobby, and I’m having a blast with it.

The route for my last ride of the month on the 29th.

NSR – July 23rd

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I made a trip to the North Sulfur River yesterday. I was was trying out a new part of the river. The FM2990 bridge had been my favorite spot on the river to hunt, but things have changed. They are damming up the river to build a new lake, Lake Ralph Hall. This has closed the fossil park near Ladonia, so they built a new parking lot and made access a lot easier at the FM2990 bridge. With all the new fossil hunters going there, I knew I needed a new spot, so yesterday, I tried this spot further down the river, at the FM2675 bridge. I didn’t find much there, so I’m going to keep looking at new spots on the river.

Like further up the river, there were lots and lots of Egogyra Ponderosa oysters, including some beautiful large specimens. But they are very heavy to carry around in a backpack, and I already have plenty of them at home, so I resisted the temptation to pick up more. You expect to find large stuff at NSR, and after hiking quite a ways down the river without finding much at all, I decided that on the hike back, I needed to start looking for small stuff.

Here are the bones from the trip. Nothing I can identify, but cool all the same. Click the photos to be able to zoom in and get a closer look.

Where I hunted further up the river, there are lots and lots of baculites to be found. Here, all I could find were small broken pieces of baculites, like the two on the left in this photo. I thought the tiny ammonite on the right was cool, though.

I’ve always liked finding pieces of worm tubes like the ones in this photo. It can be really hard to spot them at NSR, though.

And finally, the teeth. Teeth always seem to be really hard to find at NSR, and when you do, they’re usually in rough shape, like these two in the bottom photo. And the top photo shows what you’re searching in to find them.

Ellis County creek – July 8th

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After nine months, I finally made it back to the Ellis County creek where I’ve found so many teeth. This is an Eagle Ford outcrop. The water level was much higher than I expected. It wasn’t quite up to the matrix that holds most of the fossils, but high enough to make wading across the creek dicey, plus I didn’t get to hunt most of the sand bars.

This is the biggest fish vert I’ve ever found. Most of the fish verts I’ve found in this creek aren’t in very good condition either, but this one is in really nice shape. Click the photos to be able to zoom in and get a closer look.

As usual for this creek, most of the Ptychodus teeth I found were pretty small, but I did find these two nicer ones.

These are still in the matrix. They are mosasaur verts. I’ve never found mosasaur verts in the creek before, and today I found two of them.

As usual for this creek, I brought home lots of interesting looking matrix to go through.

Here are the other teeth I found. As usual, there were more Ptychodus teeth than anything else. I’m sure there will be more from the matrix. I’ll add photos after I’ve gotten through the matrix.

This photo shows how close the water level was to the matrix holding fossils.

Update: July 10th. Matrix removed, here is what I brought home. I’m always amazed at the number of Ptychodus teeth in this creek.

The Hospital Again

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I ended up doing 12 rides for 380 miles in the month of June. That’s the most miles I’ve had in a month since last September, but the month ended the same way last month did, with me in the hospital and off the bike for days. It was pneumonia this time, found after I had a fever of 101.7 Saturday night. I’ll rest a few days then go back to riding.

Last Wednesday’s ride.

100 miles this week

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I took off on the F5 this morning and rode out to Big Rock Road, for 40 miles. That gives me 100 miles this week. For many years, I averaged 100+ miles a week, but between severe COVID in October, a heart attack in February, heart valve replacement in April, and a car crash in May, this was the first time in eight months that I’ve gotten 100 miles in a week. It felt good.

I’m still slow on the bike, but I’m seeing progress in improving. Today was the first time since I got back on the bike that I managed to do the entire ride without using the small chainring. It was also the first time I’ve averaged over 14 mph for the ride. I don’t know how close I’ll get to the level I was at last year, but I’ll take what improvements I can get.

I ended up with a total of 240 miles ridden in May. I had managed a couple of 80 mile weeks in a row, but a May 22nd car crash kept me off the bike for the rest of the month.

Today’s route.

Back on the bike

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I took off on the F5 this morning and rode out to FM2938 and back for a 20 mile ride. It was my first time on a bike since Marth 10th, and my first outdoor ride since October. I had taken time off the bike after my heart attack and didn’t ride again until February 20th. By early March my aortic heart valve had gotten really bad, plus my heart doctors were advising against riding until after it was replaced, so I quit riding after March 10th, until today. I ended up with just 65 miles ridden in February and 82 miles in March.

I am now eight days past aortic heart valve replacement. Today’s ride made it obvious that my fitness level is completely shot. Nothing to do but go to work on that.

Today’s route.

Declining Health

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After a promising recovery from COVID most of December, I had a serious setback near the end of the month, and the decline of my health continued and intensified in January and February. I did three rides totaling 70 miles that first full week of January, then managed only 40 miles the next week. My breathing worsened to the point I could only do 1500 on the spirometer, and I didn’t ride at all the next week. I had a slight improvement and did a couple of 15 mile rides that last week of January, but after that last ride, it was obvious that I couldn’t continue, so I stopped riding again. I ended up with 160 miles for the month.

My body wasn’t lying when it told me to stop. On February 4th, I had a heart attack. It wasn’t a major heart attack. The blockage was in an obtuse marginal artery, and a single stent fixed it. But the cardiac surgeon discovered, and an echocardiogram the next day confirmed, that I have severe aortic stenosis. The cardiac doctor said I need an aortic valve replacement right away. I had been diagnosed with moderate aortic stenosis three and a half years ago, and had no clue it had become this severe. I was, after all, still averaging 100 miles a week on the bike in October, before I got COVID.

The degree of aortic stenosis is measured by the pressure difference between the two sides of the valve. 25 to 40 is moderate. Anything over 40 is severe. Mine is 65. 80 is critical, so I’m closer to critical than moderate. Severe aortic stenosis can cause fluid buildup in the lungs, so it may be contributing to my lung issues. I won’t know how much until I get that valve replaced. Strenuous exercise is a big NO with severe aortic stenosis, so I’m going to remain limited in what I can do until I get that valve replacement. I didn’t even have a cardiac doctor, so now I’m waiting for a referral from the VA for a cardiac doctor, who will then refer me to to the specialist who will do the valve replacement.

While all this was going on, the VA has put me on some new inhalers, and they seem to be slowly helping. With all the dire weather stuff here, I hadn’t even checked my lungs with the spirometer lately, and was surprised to find yesterday that I can once again do 2500 on it. That’s a big improvement. I still have a lot of wheezing. I’m hoping that may improve soon too. I decided that with my improved lung function, I should try riding again, so today, I did a 10 mile ride on the Xstream. I kept things at a very easy pace, keeping my heart rate under 130. That’s probably as much effort as I should be putting out until I get my valve replacement.

I’m exhausted now. After just a 10 mile ride. It’s a pretty safe bet that I’ll never get back to the state of fitness I was enjoying last October. All I can do is be as active as my present health will allow, then see what I can do after recovering from valve replacement. I’m looking at a long road to recovery ahead.