@mark-ryan – this is very interesting. It’s so fun to speculate!!! Especially when everything is so unknown. It’s certainly a possibility that the single star shaped feature is an astrorhizae – but I’ve never only seen one have you? Usually it’s a whole mess across a surface, usually associated with monticules – but these are usuals, there are…[Read more]

Hi @mark-ryan & @vperez – this is a weird one. I am not sure about stromatoporoid, those are calcified so I would expect better preservation. It’s possible that the circular bit on the ‘bottom’ is a nucleation point for a sponge or something trying to anchor down – so it could be an unrelated animal piece. That star shaped pattern on top is also…[Read more]

Hi there @mark-ryan You can update the Geochron to Eon: Phanerozoic Era: Paleozoic Period: Ordovician. Based on this group’s fossils, this looks like it may indeed be an Ordovician sponge. Here are some resources for further ID research: http://www.fossilspot.com/STATES/MN.HTM…[Read more]