Ohio Petrified Wood Part 3 - Psaronius

Made another attempt to today find petrified wood in Ohio in Barnesville Belmont County area, using this article as a guide:
        The Aboriginal Use of Petrified Wood In Southeastern Ohio

We drove into Barnesville on route OH 800 and followed OH 148 to the southeast toward the Powhatan Point.   Making a short story long... we did not find any petrified wood ourselves.  Recent rains made raised the creek levels quite abit.  However, in the search area, we did visit with an older gentleman who has been collecting wood in the area for 60 years and has a wonderful collection.

So the area does produce petrified just need to visit sometime in Sept/Oct when the water levels will be low.

Ohio Petrified Wood Part 2 - Psaronius

Back in the early 1980s, I went on several collecting trips to the Barnesville, Ohio area to hunt for petrified wood but never found any.  Last year (2018) , I finally acquired several pieces of 'Barnesville' petrified wood which is a fossil fern trunk and root clusters of Psaronius.  The wood is typically very dark brown to black with clear to white patches of quartz.

I bought the first two pieces from eBay, abit pricey but I've seen so little of it for sale over the years.
Afterwards, I bought three much larger pieces from the Stark County Mineral show (April 2018) in the silent auction.  My final piece which is the largest, my wife found at the Hartville Flea Market in June 2018 for a bargain price of $20.00.

If you find yourself in northeast Ohio in late March April, I recommend the Stark County Mineral show.

Facebook Page: Stark County Mineral Society

Stark County Gem and Mineral Club - March 30-31—CANTON, OHIO:

Annual show; Stark County Gem and Mineral Club; Stark County Fairgrounds, 305 Wertz Ave. ; Sat. 9-5, Sun. 10-5; adults $5, seniors (55+) $4, children (6-14) $1, free admission for scouts in uniform; 52nd annual show with vendors offering minerals, rocks, gems, lapidary art and supplies, demonstrations, displays, and activities for children; contact Jeffrey Storz, 4547 Brunnerdale Avenue NW, Canton, OH 44718, (740) 680-7714; Email: jstorz42@gmail.com; Websitehttp://www.geologyin.com/p/blog-page_75.html#BkymimjAXeZrsOzy.99 Follow us: @GeologyTime on Twitter

Here are phots showing cross sectional wood texture of Psaronius:

Here are photos showing 'with the grain' texture of Psaronius:

Fossil collecting at Hueston Woods, Ohio

At the end of June, I visited Hueston Woods state park and went fossil collecting. The first time I visited the park was 30 years ago when I was in high school. My memory of the collecting areas were vague as well as the park amendities. The park is located near Miami University of Ohio near Oxford, Ohio. A very nice little college town. The fossil collecting was very good, although I did not find any geodizd brachiopods with calcite I had collected 30 years ago. There were a few locations north of Oxford outside the park which I did not get to visit. There is brachipod thick horizon in the limestone which probably has these geodized brachs. After 30 years, this is still a great place to collect fossils. Great specimens can still be found! Links: http://visithw.com/things-to-do/fossil-hunting

Photos from Fossil Park, Sylvania, Ohio

Photos taken June 26, 2012.
This is the main collecting area within the park.
Collecting at the park yielded some nice specimens: brachipods, gastropods, and trilobites.  There was plenty of nice material to collect.
Found some nice brachiopods…
Found some gastropods and even some corals.


It took awhile but eventually found some trilobite pieces: tails from phacop rana sp. and even a head.

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