Texas Fossils: An Amateur Collector's Handbook

BUREAU OF ECONOMIC GEOLOGY The University of Texas at Austin Austin, Texas 78712 John T. Lonsdale, Director
Guidebook 2
By William H. Matthews III
November 1960 Second Printing, July 1963 Third Printing, August 1967 Fourth Printing, June 1971 Fifth Printing, November 1973 Sixth Printing, April 1976 Seventh Printing, November 1978 Eighth Printing, September 1981 Ninth Printing, August 1984
Plate 1 GEOLOGIC TIME SCALE
ERA PERIOD EPOCH CHARACTERISTIC LIFE CENOZOIC “Recent Life” QUATERNARY 1 MILLION YEARS Recent Pleistocene TERTIARY 64 MILLION YEARS Pliocene Miocene Oligocene Eocene Paleocene MESOZOIC “Middle Life” CRETACEOUS 70 MILLION YEARS JURASSIC 45 MILLION YEARS TRIASSIC 50 MILLION YEARS PALEOZOIC “Ancient Life” PERMIAN 55 MILLION YEARS CARBONIFEROUS PENNSYLVANIAN 30 MILLION YEARS MISSISSIPPIAN 35 MILLION YEARS DEVONIAN 55 MILLION YEARS SILURIAN 20 MILLION YEARS ORDOVICIAN 75 MILLION YEARS CAMBRIAN 100 MILLION YEARS PRECAMBRIAN ERAS PROTEROZOIC ERA ARCHEOZOIC ERA APPROXIMATE AGE OF THE EARTH MORE THAN 3 BILLION 300 MILLION YEARS
Almost everyone has seen the fossilized remains of prehistoric plants or animals. These might have been the skeleton of a gigantic dinosaur, the petrified trunk of an ancient tree, or the shells of snails or oysters that lived in the great seas that covered Texas millions of years ago.
In addition, a group of selected references has been included for the reader who wishes to know more about earth history and paleontology. Many of these publications provide references of a more technical nature for the more advanced or serious collector, and some of them list excellent collecting localities.
Fossils are the remains or evidence of ancient plants or animals that have been preserved in the rocks of the earth’s crust. Most fossils represent the preservable hard parts of some prehistoric organism that once lived in the area in which the remains were collected.
During the earliest periods of recorded history, certain Greek scholars found the remains of fish and sea shells in desert and mountainous regions. These men were greatly puzzled by the occurrence of these objects at such great distances from the sea, and some of them devoted considerable time to an explanation of their presence.