48 million year old fossilised wood of Schinoxylon sp.
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- Bruce Williams
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48 million year old fossilised wood of Schinoxylon sp.
Hi folks,
This is a posting to both forums.
You are looking at a piece of fossilised branch (~5cm in diameter and 10cm long). It comes from the Green River Formation in the Blue Forest area of SW Wyoming. Fossils from this formation are known to be ~48 million years old. The presence of resin ducts lying along the medullary rays rather than following the line of the tree rings indicate that this is a Schinoxylon sp. (a member of the cashew family, Anacardiaceae).
The fossil weighs 502g.
The blue/gray areas are agate. Tree rings and cellular structure as well as some of the bark detail has survived fossilisation - see posting in Microscope Forum:
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... 1742#11742
Bruce
This is a posting to both forums.
You are looking at a piece of fossilised branch (~5cm in diameter and 10cm long). It comes from the Green River Formation in the Blue Forest area of SW Wyoming. Fossils from this formation are known to be ~48 million years old. The presence of resin ducts lying along the medullary rays rather than following the line of the tree rings indicate that this is a Schinoxylon sp. (a member of the cashew family, Anacardiaceae).
The fossil weighs 502g.
The blue/gray areas are agate. Tree rings and cellular structure as well as some of the bark detail has survived fossilisation - see posting in Microscope Forum:
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... 1742#11742
Bruce
Amazing piece of fossilized wood. Looks like some parts are older than others.
Maybe there are fossilized worms inside.
How about investigate it with CT (computed tomography) or other appropriate method?
Maybe there are fossilized worms inside.
How about investigate it with CT (computed tomography) or other appropriate method?
The meaning of beauty is in sharing with others.
P.S.
Noticing of my "a" and "the" and other grammar
errors are welcome.
P.S.
Noticing of my "a" and "the" and other grammar
errors are welcome.
- Bruce Williams
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- Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 1:41 pm
- Location: Northamptonshire, England
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Thanks for your comments guys.
Nikola - It's not at all uncommon to find fossilised evidence of bug infestation. Steve Valley would be the expert here, but I have fossilised wood with tunnels and chambers that look like they were made yesterday. I'll post some pics sometime soon.
Doug - Not the easiest piece to do a ring count as the medullary rays tend to dominate everything else within the photo (not so much thru the microscope eyepiece) - interesting idea though - I may have to experiment with the lighting to try and emphasise the rings .
Adrian - Absolutely - and there is so much variation due to the almost limitless permutations of timescale, chemistry, species, location and the actual fossilisation process itself.
Bruce
Nikola - It's not at all uncommon to find fossilised evidence of bug infestation. Steve Valley would be the expert here, but I have fossilised wood with tunnels and chambers that look like they were made yesterday. I'll post some pics sometime soon.
Doug - Not the easiest piece to do a ring count as the medullary rays tend to dominate everything else within the photo (not so much thru the microscope eyepiece) - interesting idea though - I may have to experiment with the lighting to try and emphasise the rings .
Adrian - Absolutely - and there is so much variation due to the almost limitless permutations of timescale, chemistry, species, location and the actual fossilisation process itself.
Bruce
- Mike B in OKlahoma
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- Location: Oklahoma City
My grandmother (a woman limited to an 8th grade education, but boundlessly curious about the world) gave me a rock very similar to this when I was a child, telling me it was a stalactite/stalagmite from a cave....The bark wasn't as distinct as your specimen, so I always accepted that (how could Grandma be wrong?!"). Now I'm going to have to find that rock amongst all my dusty boxes of mementos, and see if it is actually petrified wood.
Mike Broderick
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
- Mike B in OKlahoma
- Posts: 1048
- Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 10:32 pm
- Location: Oklahoma City
Re: 48 million year old fossilised wood of Schinoxylon sp.
I'm ignorant about anything that doesn't have a pulse, but curious (like Grandma!) can you relate what we see in the fossil to the sentence above?Bruce Williams wrote: The presence of resin ducts lying along the medullary rays rather than following the line of the tree rings indicate that this is a Schinoxylon sp. (a member of the cashew family, Anacardiaceae).
Mike Broderick
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
- Bruce Williams
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- Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 1:41 pm
- Location: Northamptonshire, England
- Contact:
Mike - If your Grandma's gift does turn out to be a stalactite or stalagmite as she thought, it will still be an interesting piece and worth photographing. I for one would be very interested to see a sawn and sanded cross section, prepared along the lines of the concrete in Rik's recent posting.
I'll try and answer your question about the resin ducts etc - although its a huge subject and I'm certainly no expert. Firstly, if you haven't already done so I suggest you check out the related Microscope Forum posting "Cell and ray detail in 48 million year old fossilised wood" which shows details of the medullary rays and cell structure:
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... php?t=2016
Identification of fossil wood is usually based on similarities with living species and fortunately there are a number of books on the subject of identifying modern woods. A good and faily cheap "starter" is "Identifying Wood: Accurate Results with Simple Tools" by R. Bruce Hoadley. If you've got the money a really great book on the subject of identifying fossilised wood is, "Ancient Forests" by Frank Daniels and Richard Dayvault.
Of particular significance is the look/structure of the bark and (when viewed in cross section) the grain pattern produced by the annual rings and the medullary rays (radiating from centre to bark). The presence/colour/transition of earlywoods and latewoods and the presence and arrangement of earlywood/latewood pores are also very important factors in pinning down the species of tree ....and of course there are many more identifying characteristics that may helpfully be looked at - eg, resin ducts.
If present, resin ducts (see pic2, Microscope Forum posting) can either be radially or axially oriented and typically are shaped like drawn out ovals. Now the chap that I bought this "log" from (a major supplier of fossil wood) obviously considered the presence and arrangement of the resin ducts to be particularly diagnostic of a Schinoxylon species as he singled out that observation to be included on the specimen card that came with the fossil wood.
Hope that helps a bit.
Bruce
I'll try and answer your question about the resin ducts etc - although its a huge subject and I'm certainly no expert. Firstly, if you haven't already done so I suggest you check out the related Microscope Forum posting "Cell and ray detail in 48 million year old fossilised wood" which shows details of the medullary rays and cell structure:
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... php?t=2016
Identification of fossil wood is usually based on similarities with living species and fortunately there are a number of books on the subject of identifying modern woods. A good and faily cheap "starter" is "Identifying Wood: Accurate Results with Simple Tools" by R. Bruce Hoadley. If you've got the money a really great book on the subject of identifying fossilised wood is, "Ancient Forests" by Frank Daniels and Richard Dayvault.
Of particular significance is the look/structure of the bark and (when viewed in cross section) the grain pattern produced by the annual rings and the medullary rays (radiating from centre to bark). The presence/colour/transition of earlywoods and latewoods and the presence and arrangement of earlywood/latewood pores are also very important factors in pinning down the species of tree ....and of course there are many more identifying characteristics that may helpfully be looked at - eg, resin ducts.
If present, resin ducts (see pic2, Microscope Forum posting) can either be radially or axially oriented and typically are shaped like drawn out ovals. Now the chap that I bought this "log" from (a major supplier of fossil wood) obviously considered the presence and arrangement of the resin ducts to be particularly diagnostic of a Schinoxylon species as he singled out that observation to be included on the specimen card that came with the fossil wood.
Hope that helps a bit.
Bruce
Last edited by Bruce Williams on Fri Mar 16, 2007 2:53 am, edited 5 times in total.
- Bruce Williams
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- Mike B in OKlahoma
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It wasn't sawn and sanded, but the ends were cut. My recollection is of a rock that looked like milky quartz, but I haven't laid eyes on it probably in at least twenty years, so not positive. I'm going to have to look for it!Bruce Williams wrote:Mike - If your Grandma's gift does turn out to be a stalactite or stalagmite as she thought, it will still be an interesting piece and worth photographing. I for one would be very interested to see a sawn and sanded cross section, prepared along the lines of the concrete in Rik's recent posting.
Mike Broderick
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome
"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin
- Bruce Williams
- Posts: 1120
- Joined: Mon Oct 30, 2006 1:41 pm
- Location: Northamptonshire, England
- Contact:
I haven't checked this posting for a while and so missed the last 2 replies. So my apologies to Danny and Mike for not replying sooner.
Your very supportive comments are really greatly appreciated Danny - IMO it's the people as much as the postings that make the forum!
If you do find it Mike there are a number of small companies on the web that will cut and polish it for you at quite reasonable prices.
Bruce
Your very supportive comments are really greatly appreciated Danny - IMO it's the people as much as the postings that make the forum!
If you do find it Mike there are a number of small companies on the web that will cut and polish it for you at quite reasonable prices.
Bruce