North Sulfur River Field Trip

North Sulfur River Field Trip
January 28-29, 2006
It didn’t rain enough.
By Neal Immega

t was a dark and stormy day. Intermittent rain showers expanding to mittent rain showers. Message on the two-way radio: “Neal, I am having serious traction issues back here.” Ropes tied to mesquite trees so we can get back up the bank. More weight from mud on our boots than on the specimens in the trunk. Field trip members, lined up on the bridge watching the gray flood below. Only Lewis Hall would risk his camera in the rain to take a group photo at the Bug Tussle store. You would think this was a pretty typical Immega field trip, but sadly, it was still not enough rain. Escaped Lunatics!

Real Troupers!
I have wanted to collect vertebrates from the Sulfur River for ages. The target area is bounded by Commerce, Wolfe City (likely named by George Wolf), Ben Franklin (a possible source for lightning rods?), and Honey Grove (no bees, no trees). It consists of artificial outcrops made by a WPA project that cut a real channel for the Peace River. The rock is upper Cretaceous, the Ozan Member of the Taylor formation. It contains mosasaur vertebra and teeth, shark teeth, and parts from many fish including a huge, big‑toothed fish named Xiphactinus (though his friends just call him Sir).
A bad day fossil collecting is better than a good day in the office!	I have heard that after a rain, folks from the Dallas Paleo Society wait on the bridges for the water to go down so they can be first on the site. Lies and slander. It just is not true. During my one day in the rain, I saw four carloads of people waiting IN the river for the water to go down, and only a few were from Dallas Paleo. So, don’t believe everything you hear—it is actually much worse. I had never visited this area, and as a result they were suffering from a record drought. There was no rain in the previous eight weeks, and the stock tanks were dry. We got an inch of rain (mostly down the back of my neck), but it soaked in and only a little water went down the river. The flow did not even erase the tracks of the 4‑wheelers that people use to race up and down the riverbed. (A local man said that people look for skeletons that way.)
	Ladonia, Texas really wants your business, and they have a park right on the river to make it easy for you to get in and out. They have a graveled parking lot, a four-stall carport to keep you out of the sun (rain?), concrete stairs to the river, and a pickup load of tooth-containing rock next to the parking lot for the less adventuresome people to pick through. Park north of Ladonia on Hwy. 50.
We did find mosasaur vertebra and teeth, but not enough to make the trip a huge success. A much more interesting stop was at a place (location withheld) where a red limey bed can be found that has an amazing concentration of shark teeth, maybe 1%. I am considering using it in the next shark tooth dig at the science museum. We also visited the ever-popular Post Oak Creek at Sherman, TX. This locality is public (e-mail me if you want it) because there is an unlimited amount of sand containing vertebrate material under the bridge. It is not nearly as rich in teeth as the red bed, but there are more than you would find at the Midlothian quarries.	Steps to the river from the park
So, the trip was a success if we want material to run a shark tooth dig but not for finding mosasaur parts. The farmers and ranchers should hire me to visit every one of the drought-stricken places in Texas. Maybe I could stay until all the stock tanks were full and the river was running bank to bank. I might take as my fee the guarantee that HGMS gets to be first into the creeks after the water goes down.
1 inch Mosasaur tooth	Post Oak Creek, Sherman, TX