Caesar Creek Fossil Hunt

Wednesday, September 30, 2020

Caesar Creek Fossil Hunt

Tom and I met Jim Saylor at his condo in Lebanon about 10 AM yesterday and drove to Caesar Creek Lake for a fossil hunt ...

We spent about three hours combing both sides of the spillway located about a mile south of the Visitor Center. Permits (free) are required. Check in here for location and additional information. And here's a good post specifically about fossil hunting at the spillway.

Due to COVID, the Visitor Center was closed. But a ranger told us to call the phone number posted on the door and we could get a verbal permit. Jim gave his name and the type of car we'd have parked at the spillway and the ranger said that was all that was needed.

Both sides of the spillway are cut into the Ordovician strata. That's the same as the railroad cut in Miamisburg where Jim and I previously hunted. To the right of this photo is a large, level plane (see below) , also littered with rocks that share the same age (488.3 to 443.7 million years ago).

This area is known for brachiopods, cephalopods, bryozoans, gastropod, crinoids and horn coral and trilobites. We were specifically hunting for trilobites, but found none. The others are easy to find. Jim talked to another man who was also hunting trilobites. He also left empty-handed.

The wall on the south side is marked "no climbing" but it's a fairly gentle angle and is easily scaled. Here's Tom (l) and Jim near the top. The north side is a much more gentle slope.

I, meanwhile, stayed closer to the bottom. As I age (71) I find walking on rough ground more difficult.

Jim really got into this work.

Every rock has thousands of fossils embedded in it.

When we got home, Tom sorted through his collection and left them atop our picnic table for the rain to wash clean.

These are typical of what we found. Brachiopod (l), cephalopod (2nd from left, top), gastropod (below), another cephalopod and who-knows-what on the right.