Feb. 28th - March 5th

In late February, Toothsnob invited me to a site where he had gotten into a sweet spot the weekend before.  It isn't the easiest place on the river to access and the conditions are pretty tough, especially in winter.  Toothsnob had arrived earlier on the 28th, and as usual I arrived later since I have better than a 1 1/2 hour ride and usually have to drop off my kids at Pop's house on the way.  When I got there, Toothsnob had already done a lot of work moving gravel and muck and opened up a very productive area.  I almost felt bad coming in because he had done a huge amount of work discovering this, but I dug in and immediately started snagging teeth.  Early into it I came up with a very rare and nearly perfect xiphodolamia, and it only got better from there.  Toothsnob had found a few makos, one of them was real big and I soon came up with my first mako for the day which was 2 1/4 inches and perfect.  Then my luck really came on and I found 4 more giant makos, mostly in good shape and some over 2". To top it all off I found 2 chubs in pretty good shape.  Needless to say we walked out of there late, tired, wet and filthy.  It don't get better than this does it?

On the following weekend, belive it or not, we ended up in the same place.  This was fittingly "Toothsnob's day".  I had a slow day, although I did very well on sand tigers and one nice little snaggletooth.  Toothsnob on the other hand found a few chubs and a few monster mako's.  I hope he posts some of his collection soon.

I also have added a bit of cretaceous stuff that I would like to share.  Most of the stuff was from February but a few are from 2008.  This particular trip turned up some real big squalicorax and a few mososaur teeth etc. Most were a bit beat up but I added a few things from 08 on the right side.  Of my particualar favorites are the xiphactinus (which is mostly enameled), and the ice age horse tooth. I also added a few belemnites, they're common but cool.

Before closing my first NJ post I must convey thanks to Toothsnob and Toothpuller.  In the past few years I have been advantaged by their dilligent research and hard work.  They also turned me on to Black River Fossils.  Hats off to you guys, and thanks to you BRF members for sharing your info..