Tell on yourself

[Older The Better]

Been noticing a lot of new members asking about various stones, I appreciate the members that do the dirty work of setting them straight… but had me thinking we all had to learn so I thought I’d post about something I feel pretty silly about now.
I was walking a creek and found 3 pieces of bone with a v pattern of holes below a lip, after much searching of various bones I concluded they must be carved… I was excited and showed a guy that had been collecting in the area a long time and he quickly id’s them as part of an armadillo tail… I didn’t believe him and disagreed saying I googled armadillos and didn’t see any such bones… turns out as I ran into more dead armadillos as they spread north, he was dead right and I was humbled a bit… feel free to tell on yourself maybe there will be lessons in there some of us haven’t picked up yet

 

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[antmike915]

Not much of a story but when I was 11 I found my 1st official artifact site. I kept every flake and chunk I found because I didn't know if they were anything or not at the time. All the round and odd shaped normal rocks (wasn't many) I threw in the river. As time went by and I started learning more I put up my definite artifacts from my "maybe " piles into Tupperware containers and waste shards, ect... into my rock gardens.

Also I learned after reading alot, seeing pictures and some other collectors wisdom; a few of those round normal looking rocks happened to be hammer stones. Back then I know that I've thrown countless of them away.

 

[Older The Better]

Appreciate the story, thought maybe this idea could help show that members aren’t just grumpy a-holes who refuse to believe that new folks might have something, we all had to start somewhere… in the first spot I ever knew of I took home every rock too, I’d sit down and brush each one off and inspect, I had a big pile of possible artifacts that, as I learned more, I realized were 95% rocks

 

[dirstscratcher]

When I first started collecting I brought everything home to look at and figure out what it was. I could tell when flint was worked, but dumped any worked fragments in the flower pots and beds. Then I learned what thumbnail scrapers were, and had to excavate the flowers to re-collect my artifacts. I had one primary field that I hunted and ended up with a pretty sizable collection of scrapers.

 

[newnan man]

I still have rocks from the 60's that I thought were artifacts. In the yard around trees now.

 

[Aurora1959]

I bought this at a yard sale during the early, ignorant years of My Obsession. I also bought a handful of those colorful souvenir arrowheads. The guy said he had a screened topsoil business and all these items had been found in his screens. He lied. I now know that this is a concretion with a fool's gold inclusion, but for years I believed it was a duck effigy.

 

[LandSeig]

My stone “ax” that I was so sure of. I found a couple of years ago when I was new to the site. It’s not one, but learning to trust other folks judgement that have much more experience is a must for this hobby. It helped me to learn about what to look for and recently I was able to find a nice Mano just from the flat ground faces in a very popular beach.

“Stone ax”

Real Mano

 

[unclemac]

What we all know here is that the "group" is always right! Heck yes, I have picked up my share of not-o-facts, and some of them are so spot on that I am temped to alter (just a bit) so to prove my point! I have several rocks that I can't explain but that means nothing because.. shucks... nature can do whatever she wants.

 

[Buckleberry]

I found a very cool disc shaped "artifact" I was sure was a pendant, pretty excited and then posted it and everyone pointed out it was just a butcher cut bone, likely from a round steak, lol.

Met a guy once and he told me he had a nice "children's axe head" he found, so I asked him to bring it the next time we met and he did it was a fossilized shell about 1 1/2" across...HA!

 

[joshuaream]

Crinoid "beads" and rocks with natural holes.

I had hundreds of crinoid stem segments I thought were beads, and the gravel in my grandparents very long driveway was full of rocks with natural holes.

 

[OntarioArch]

A rectangular chunk of dirt encrusted, hard, dense agricultural rubber - tire or conveyor belt maybe - that I proudly took home as a 'gorget.' Wow................

 

[Tdog]

Crinoid "beads" and rocks with natural holes.

I had hundreds of crinoid stem segments I thought were beads, and the gravel in my grandparents very long driveway was full of rocks with natural holes.

Guilty of this same thing. I still find them occasionally in the driveway pea gravel here.

 

[southfork]

I had puka? Hippy beads mixed in with my real deal shell beads that I posted. I was told within minutes of my blunder.

 

[dirstscratcher]

Crinoid "beads" and rocks with natural holes.

I had hundreds of crinoid stem segments I thought were beads, and the gravel in my grandparents very long driveway was full of rocks with natural holes.

There are examples of crinoids that were used as beads. There's a display at the Battelle Darby Creek Nature Center (SW of Columbus, Ohio) of a sizeable pile of crinoid beads found in a mound.

 

[yakker]

Well... I still think this is a hoe.

and I gave this away years after finding it (in my defense, I moved twice...

and that thing behind the broken axe? I was SURE it was a celt-in-the-making LOLOL🙄(ooooold photo, bad focus!)

 

[Buckleberry]

The hoe is interesting...looks to be worked in that pic...what's the deal with the tally marked piece?

 

[digi-shots]

I’ve got my share of Tupperware filled with “rocks”.. I think there is a hammerstone or two in the mix. I can’t bring myself to toss them… maybe even a Mano.

There was one site I searched and found some broken pottery… I would pick up every little piece I could find.