Fossils Confirmed, But Not What I Thought

I'll be providing more details later, but this morning I had an appointment with a paleontologist at the Texas Tech University Museum. In short, most of my fossils are of coral, age ranges are Permian to Cretaceous, and the "tooth" and "claws" turned out to be endocasts of extinct clams. These clams had some oddities. Endocasts of these clams do greatly resemble Oviraptor and Deinonychus claws and have been marketed as such to the unwary. These clam species bit the dust during the great extinction event marking the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary. The corals are also extinct, and have been for a long time. None of these fossils (they are fossils, at least) are particularly rare. So I will probably display them. It is possible they were collected in Texas, since they are not uncommon at several Texas sites. Exact locations will never be known, therefore exact ages can't be given. I will have more information when I have time to upload it. What we are dealing with here are specimens of CANINIA TORQUIA RUGOSE CORAL, Pennsylvanian-Permian, 315 to 250 million years ago, and endocasts of RUDISTED CLAM of the family CAPRINIDAE, and they are Cretaceous, approx. 110 million years old. The claw like features are of the upper part of the shell, which was not hinged, and the tooth-like feature is an endocast of the lower part of the shell. These were very odd clams!


It's great to live in a university town! There is knowledge and expertise at your fingertips! I hate to think of what Lubbock would have been without Texas Tech!