After the rains of the previous week, I decided to get a jump start on the upcoming Dry Dredgers field trip and visit my favorite Whitewater site, a road cut in Richmond, IN. This is a great site for brachiopods, with plentiful clean Hebertella, Vinlandostrophia, Rhynchotrema dentatum, Rafinesquina and Strophomena. There are many bryozoa to
If you’re like me, when you think about fossils in the eastern USA, you probably think of either Cenozoic fossils along the eastern and gulf coasts (e.g. Miocene/Pliocene/Pleistocene shark teeth, whale vertebra, and shells in Virginia and the Carolinas) or Paleozoic fossils further inland (e.g. Cambrian trilobites in Georgia or Carboniferous plants in Pennsylvania). Or,
In the fossil community, there has been much discussion about the connection between amateur and professional paleontologists, especially in light of new legislation that may restrict amateur collecting opportunities on government land. This blog post will not venture into the debate about that, but rather will focus on a recent example of collaboration between
In this post, I will share some of my whale finds from the late Oligocene Chandler Bridge formation from the Summerville, SC area (Chattian age – 27.5 Ma). The Chandler Bridge along with the underlying Ashley formation (Rupelian age – 29.2 Ma) make up the richest deposit of Oligocene marine vertebrates ever described. As I
Spring is coming early here in the Cincinnati region, and it is fossil hunting season again (of course, some of us never stopped for winter…). Sunday afternoon, my wife Christa and I drove to Indiana to employ one of our favorite collecting tactics: finding fossils in a downpour. While it is not always the most pleasant
In the fossil community, there has been much discussion about the connection between amateur and professional paleontologists, especially in light of new legislation that may restrict amateur collecting opportunities on government land. This blog post will not venture into the debate about that, but rather will focus on a recent example of collaboration between
My first post is about a field trip I made to my favorite old fossil ditch while I was visiting family in Summerville, SC this past Christmas. The site is a flood control ditch in my old neighborhood, and is a site I have collected nearly continuously for 30+ years. Though only 6-8 feet deep,
While outdoor field trips this time of year can be iffy because of the roller coaster weather, a dry place to collect is the basement (or garage, or shed, or….). Periodically, I mine my basement and garage, especially prior to a show, as I decide which specimens to take with me. My current focus
