What fossils can I collect from public lands?
Visitors to public lands are welcome to collect reasonable amounts of many kinds of fossils without a BLM permit. These materials must be for your personal collection and cannot be sold or traded. No permit is needed for plant fossils, such as leaves, stems, and cones, or common invertebrate fossils, such as ammonites and trilobites. It’s important to check with your local office for more specific information, since some invertebrate and plant localities may be significant and are closed to casual collection. Petrified wood can be collected too—up to 25 pounds each day, plus one piece, but no more than 250 pounds in any calendar year. Vertebrate fossils are any remains or traces of animals with backbones. A BLM permit is needed for the collection of vertebrate fossils, such as dinosaur bones, fish, teeth of any kind, turtle shells, and tracks. Traces of vertebrate fossils also include coprolites, which are fossilized waste (feces). Along with tracks and trackways, these trace fossils provide important clues into the lifestyle of extinct animals. One of the oldest mammals ever documented occurs in a coprolite! BLM permits are generally issued only to professional paleontologists, who must agree to preserve their finds in a public museum, a college, or a university because of their relative rarity and scientific importance. More information about fossil collecting on public lands can be found at your local BLM office and in the BLM brochure, Fossils on America’s Public Lands.
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