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The Fish Fossils of Wyoming

All Fossil Fish Photographs are from the Official Book
Bulletin 63
Paleontology of the Green River Formation
2nd edition
By Lance Grande

Published by The Geological Survey of Wyoming
Date of Publication 1984
Photographs

Diplomystus                    Notogoneus                   Knightia

Priscacara

Mioplosis                   Phareodus

Seasonally some 55 million years ago, in the Green river region of Wyoming, torrential rains would occur in the mountains. The rain would flow down the mountain sides and then wide shallow lakes would form in the valley below. When the dry season would occur these lakes would dry up due to evaporation ( similar to certain parts of Africa today). Millions of fish would die in this short period of time. This climatic cycle happened over a 20 thousand year period. Layer upon layer of mud was deposited over these years entombing all these fish. At a much later date volcanic activity uplifted this area to expose all those layers of fossil fish .

Knightia

Gosiutichthys parvus

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Gosiutichthys parvus # 18 ( Known as a Mass Mortality Plate )
Age - Eocene
Location - LaBarge, Wyoming, USA.
Size - avg. from 1/2" to 2" long.
Size -20 " x 17 " matrix.
$ 450 Display Stand included with your purchase.
Item # fsh/parvus18-app450

Note: There are 58 complete fish and 28 partial fish on this plate !
That is why it is called MASS MORTALITY PLATE .

FYI: The Location for these fossils was closed by the State Of Wyoming back in 1988.
       Any specimens of this type that you may see for sale are from old collections . We call these types of plates Mass Mortality Plates because of the amount of fish that died in a small area. We have not had these fish plates for over 15 years.

Diplomystus

sold out

Notogoneus

Please Read
The  specimens below came from my collection and I got them some 20 years ago. The Location for these specimens was closed back in 1988 and to date I have not seen any new specimens of this type to date. Any that you may see on other web sites have come from old collections.

Priscacara

Note: Fish fossils from this area are usually found as  adults ,but juveniles of this size are very rare to be found as complete as this specimen.

Mioplosis

Section 1

Section 2

Section 3

Section 4




 

Entire Specimen
Flora & Fauna from Wyoming.

Mioplosis & Juvenile Diplomystus
& Horsetail Section # 37
Age - Eocene
Location - Lincoln County, Wyoming, USA.
Size - 4" ( Fish )
Size - 38"L x 10"W x 1" thick matrix.
$  1950.00
Item # fsh/mio37-app1950

Note: The pictures too the left are sections of the entire plate that you see on the top. The 3 lower pictures show you the many juvenile fish at a closer look.

Note: There are hundreds of the juvenile Diplomytus too many to count and as you can see they cover the entire length of the matrix. It is rare to see so many baby fish fossilized in just a small area.

FYI: the plant fossil which may be a section of a Horsetail ( like a type of reed ) is also very rare as plant fossils are not abundant from this location which yields some of the best preserved fish in the world.

Phareodus

FYI: this species of fish is the one that usually shows teeth.

Very Rare

SOLD OUT