It was around a month ago since we last visited here. It's great when you have a property owner that looks forward to our return visits... Marianne is such a sweet lady, we are so fortunate. We all meet at our favorite truck stop south of Montgomery. After everyone arrived we head to the site. What will be the finds for the day? Will it be Cretaceous fossils from marine animals that swam the seas covering Alabama? Or will it be Pleistocene fossils from mammals that roamed the forests of Alabama, or Native American artifacts like we found the last time we were here? That is what is so exciting about coming here, you never know what you will find in this creek!
We arrive at our location, the grass in the pasture has grown very high and what does the owner of the property do, they bush hog a pathway to the edge of the tree line, and near the that tree line the grass was cut there too, so we can park our vehicles! Just wow! After a group picture I head down with others to the designated spot I was on the last time and start sifting my lil' heart away!
The first hour I didn't find a dang thing other than a rusted horseshoe! Maybe this discovery set the course for the rest of the day? I decided to move several feet to my right into a heavy current area with large rocks and gravel and started digging. The first few scoops were the same and then a whole arrowhead shows up in my sifter! Still, no teeth or anything marine fossil related? I kept digging up more gravel and another whole arrowhead and another...are you kidding me!
I found several other arrowheads one dating back to the Paleo Period and the others dated Archaic Period. I got on a roll finding arrow points, along with those were broken points called "heart breakers" and preforms...arrowheads that were started and not finished along with flakes. Pic#1- flakes, Pic#2- Pottery shards, Pic#3- Two points found in one shovel scoop, Pic#4- Preforms and Heartbreakers, Pic#5- All Archaic points except second from right... It is a Paleo Point.
As I dug deeper in the channel I started finding fossilized shark teeth and my day was made! Fossilized teeth and arrowheads, what more you could ask for! Pic#1- Enchodus teeth and piece of mandible, Pic#2- Shark teeth from Scapanorynchnus. Squalicorax and Cretalamna, Pic#3- Fish Poop, Pic#4- Modern day canines.
Alabama weather will usually dictate what you do on a summer's day, hours earlier it was a cloudy, blue sky, and today was no exception. We could hear thundering in the distance and before we know a dark cloud was on top of us! For safety, with lightening comes the thunder, so we made our way up to the vehicles to sit it out, and hoped it pass quickly. Just as we got to our vehicles a downpour began and continued for several minutes and as we looked at the weather map it didn't look too promising, so we called it and pulled out earlier than we wanted to. No one wants to get caught on a creek with flash flooding and lightening in the area, definitely not worth your life. As I hit the road I was fully satisfied and happy I got to come on this trip...it's definitely a memorable one with such a haul!
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