Horse skull

I found this in Stainsby beck Thornaby it at first had me baffled but after help from Friends on a US forum i found out it was part of a horse skull

 

 

 

I have no idea of its age as i never excavated it from the Stainton gravel beds located near by.

 

 

 

I hope these images help anyone in the future who comes across a piece like this as it had me confused for a while.

 I have been reliably informed there have been examples like this displayed in Museums listed as bear or big cat brain cases.  

    

Triassic mineral lined insect tubes, possibly Caddis fly?

 

 

I have now looked closely at two segments of this material i excavated from Mercia mudstone at Stainsby beck Thornaby on Tees. ( As reported in earlier posts.)

 

I have found at least four separate mineral lined tubes with what look like carefully placed side pieces.

 

These could as far as i know the only fossil material ever found in the Mercia mudstone in this area. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mineral lined half tubes can be seen in the centre of the image above, and just below left.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the tubes is lined with clear crystals.


 

Fossil Ancient Dog skull

This dog skull was washed from the lake bed deposits at Stainsby beck Thornaby on Tees, after major flooding, it was found alongside two separate mineralised Human Femurs.

 

The shine and colouration are created by any type of prep work i only washed and dried the skull, nothing more.

The skull had no staining nore did it have the smell i would usually expect with items that have spent any time in the beck. 

First artifacts found at Stainton excavation area.

These Artifacts were the first i found at Stainton beck, and were just down stream from were i have recently excavated Human skull fragments and a tibia shaft, from over 2 metres into the packed gravel beds.

 

1  Human male Tibia shaft

2  Human skull fragments inner brain case

3 Outer surface.

 

 

This Artifact was found in Stainton beck by myself 5 years ago, it has been described by Professionals from Durham University as firstly a possible ice skate! then a water worn piece of medieval cow bone and last but not least a regurgitated piece of bone a cow swallowed. this idea was from the main man Andy Currant of the National history museum.

The Artifact shown above and below had two equal tines when found, one was broken and lost.

The pieces below i believe are utilised animal leg bones ( Digging sticks )  one is a horse tibia, the other some type of bovine radius. These two items were also viewed by people at Durham university on a few occasions, and each time refered too as being split for marrow nothing more.

All these items where found in a very small section of Stainton beck not long after flooding, and just down stream from an exposure of the Stainton gravel beds.

 

 

 

 

 These images show very similar tools found in the orme copper mines in wales .

 

 

 

 

More organic looking material taken from mercia mudstone.

I today found more organic looking fossil material  in the Mercia mudstone outcrop at Stainsby beck Thornaby on tees. The image above shows the piece buried into the Mercia mudstone just below the tool.

The image above shows the new find before i removed the Triassic mudstone, it was buried in.

The image above and following images show the cleaned up pieces.

More as i learn more !

The image above shows one of many tubular pieces that resemble caddis fly casings

 

 

 

 

 

The images above and below i hope show what i believe could be the yellow coloured fossil larvae?

 

 

 

My good friends Andy Cooper and Roger Curry both spotted parts of these pieces dug from the Triassic Mercia mudstone outcrop at Stainsby beck Thornaby. That hinted at them being some kind of burrow system or tuffa but both spotted what looks to possibly be a section of caddis fly lavia ( of some sort ) casing.

 

 

 

 

 

The triassic mercia mudstone of Stainsby beck

Today i excavated the beck bank at stainsby beck in the south west area of Cleveland. The images show blue Mercia mudstone ( Triassic) that i uncovered.

I discovered that the Mercia mudstone is covered in exactly the same alluvial red-brown loamy friable clay that covers the Stainton gravel beds. but the gravel beds here are abscent, the very hard blood red clay that sits directly above the flat laying Mercia mudstone, has no rocks or pebbles in it, and both is intruded by and intrudes the Mercia mudstone.

Note how flat the Mercia mudstone is as are all the superficial deposits Ive excavated in the south west area of Cleveland.

The image above shows the very hard blood red clay that sits directly above the Mercia mudstone.

The last image shows the top red -brown loamy friable clay that that covers every excavation i have carried out in the south west area of Cleveland. With the blood red very hard clay below.




                                   The geological layers found at this location are as follows -

 Red - brown loamy friable clay, with very little stone or pebble content.

Blood red hard packed stoneless very dry clay, average thickness 300-400 mm

Mercia mudstone containing Tufa with fossils.

Ive recently been informed by Andy Cooper a good friend and in my mind an expert in the geology of the Cleveland area, that the red stone-clay could be the result of a fault in the Mercia deposits.

I have informed Andy that ive found that the Mercia mudstone outcrop in the Stainsby beck area of Thornaby on tees, is a lot larger than first reported, ive identified at least a 200 metre stretch of the western bankside, has visible mudstone outcrops.

Magnetic horse bone.

I recently read a report stating that magnetic material has been detected in human nasal bones, so i decided to carry out a little experiment myself. 

Firstly i sawed through a horse metacarpal, then carefully scraped the inner bone with an aluminium needle. I then placed strong magnets on the scraped out bone .

The magnets attracted the bone material i made sure there was no contamination to any of the items used. I can only presume that the bone contains some form of magnetite.