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*mjwy has resided in Sweetwater County, Wyoming since 1980, and has collected petrified wood since 1991. Welcome to collecting wood in modern times in Sweetwater County.
We have excellent preservation, grand cell structure, and other than blue in the blue forest, not much for color in our wood. Our predominent wood is eocene with minor cretaceous aracarian and fern. We have some rare fern, really nice palm wood, and, tropical hardwood that is not to hard to find for the most part. There are about 70 species of wood here locally including three dozen types of palm. All are reminescent of modern day Mississippi, Georgia, or Alabama environments. World renoun paleobotanist, Walt Wright tries to make an appearance here every summer. The Wm. D. Tidwell book "Common Fossil Plants of Western North America" is a great book focusing on the west and our Wyoming specimens are well covered.
Single frond-classic "U"shape A very rare cluster/bundle of fronds at right.
Acrostichum fern shown above, an eocene fern historically has been found east of Farson Wyoming near historic Hay Ranch. Recently the area has been under pressure and the ability to locate any specimen is becoming more and more difficult. William D. Tidwell's excellent book has very good information and pictures of the formerly 5 foot tall "boston fern" type plant.
This rare collection of surface collected acrostichum fern sold for $500 nine years ago, now trippled in price if you can find it in this quanity or quality!
The acrostichum fern appears similar to a tan celery stalk and is quite beautiful when looked at with a 10X loupe. The sponge-like cell structure is amazing. Old surface finds were amazingly beautiful, I have seen some specimens over a foot in length. Today to find any is very rare.
The cane/cluster palm wood (see the five pictures below) historically found behind the Big Sandy Dam is about dug out, I have not found any specimens in the past half dozen trips and do not go there now for cane. I still find palm and good surface hardwood further to the east. Being of the grasses family, and still under much study, I suspect that eventually the name cane will go away in another generation of wood collectors IF NOT SOONER. If you can latch on to either the cane~cluster palm or the acrostichum fern, do your best to secure a specimen as here in the area, it is scarce today. Estate collections are my only source of this material since the digging/hunting/prospecting is so poor. Maybe in a decade, more areas will erode out a few specimens and some new locations will begin to produce. The traditional areas are hunted out yes, but being the high desert, erosion is an ongoing process that changes continiously. The study of sedimentary geology is becoming more important to the wood collector as he searches for new and unpicked formations. If you get to SW Wyoming, stop by the White Mtn. Library for a look at the excellent petrified wood books, and the College here has excellent geology information, and a great display of dinosaur casts. Good luck hunting and fill in your holes.
Above pictured are cluster palm from Farson area.
Here are a couple more cluster palm close up.
Searching, what excellent scenery! Don't forget to vote if you liked the review. See my greenrivereocene.com or fossilalgae.com sites for more info. I would just love being a top 500 reviewer! One in 30 of the 1,200 visitors votes for this guide. Sadly. mjwy
Guide created: 11/01/06 (updated 10/14/09)
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