MYSTERY OBJECT FROM AN ABACO BEACH

Here’s a strange item found by Kasia when she was beachcombing with Caroline Stahala

Their preliminary thought was that it formed some part of a turtle’s shell or skeletal anatomy

It is quite small (the coin above is 1 Euro) but amazingly intricate – developed in 2 symmetrical halves, with both delicate ridged surfaces and also distinctively layered bone plates 

I sent the images to Charlotte Dunn and Diane Claridge of the BMMRO in case the object might have something to do with a dolphin or even a whale. In their opinion it is very probably part of a ray’s mouth plate. It would be very interesting to know if anyone else has found an object like this. If so please respond in the comment box. Many thanks to Charlotte and Diane for sparing the time to help with ID

STOP PRESS I have some done further investigations into the dental arrangements of rays. I turned to the really excellent website of the Florida Museum of Natural History. On the FLMNH page for SPOTTED EAGLE RAYS is a very interesting photo by Cathy Bester which she has kindly given me permission to use. It is captioned Spotted eagle ray dentition: open mouth showing tooth bands and floor and roof of mouth  This photo seems to go a good way to confirming the ID of Kasia’s object, although obviously it might be a fragment from a different type of ray 

For the FLMNH site CLICK LOGO 

GO PRESS (or whatever an extra stop press may be): see comments  from Black River Fossils for further confirmation as a ray palate