Fossil Huntress — Palaeo Sommelier

In this episode, you'll hear about some wonderful free Zoom Fossil Talks in March and May 2024.

There is no need to register. You can head on over to www.fossiltalksandfieldtrips.com and note the talk dates and times. The link will be shared live on the site on the day of the talk.

Upcoming Free Fossil Lectures via Zoom:

Sun, March 24, 2024, 2PM PST — Dan Bowen — Struck by Lightning: The Mary Anning Story

​Learn about the history of Mary Anning from Dan Bowen, Chair of the Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society (VIPS) and British Columbia Palaeontological Alliance (BCPA).

Mary Anning was an English fossil collector, dealer, and palaeontologist who became known worldwide for her discoveries in Jurassic marine fossil beds in the cliffs along the English Channel at Lyme Regis in the county of Dorset in Southwest England.

Sat, May 4, 2024, 1PM PST — Jean-Bernard Caron, Lower Cambrian Cranbrook Lagerstätte in the East Kootenay region of south-eastern British Columbia, Canada

Jean-Bernard Caron is a French and Canadian palaeontologist and curator of invertebrate palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

He will share his insights on the weird and wonderful marine fossil fauna from the many outcrops of the Lower Cambrian Eager Formation near the town of Cranbrook. His team did some extensive field work—particularly at the Silhouette Range locality—a few summers ago and we are keen to hear the results of their efforts. 

The fossils we find in the Eager Formation are slightly older than those found at the Burgess Shale Lagerstätte. Burgess is Middle Cambrian and the species match the Eager fauna one for one but the Eager fauna are much less varied.  The specimens we find are wonderfully preserved and a few have recently been re-named. Learn about new insights into the species we find here and more about the diverse team that has been studying them.

Sound the horns, beat the drums and stomp your feet—it's official! The Puntledge Elasmosaur is now British Columbia's Provincial Fossil. 

Mike Trask found the first elasmosaur in 1988 while exploring the Puntledge River with his daughter.  He found the first terrestrial dinosaur remains from Vancouver Island and coined the term "sabre-toothed salmon" of legendary fame.

It was Mike's twin brother Pat Trask, who led the excavation of the juvenile elasmosaur from the Trent River back in August 2020. Many talented souls from the Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society and Courtenay Museum joined him.  

Visit www.fossiltalksandfieldtrips.com for Free VIPS Paleo Talks & ARCHEA at www.fossilhuntress.blogspot.com or www.fossilhuntress.com for more yummy goodness!

Vancouver Island holds many wonderful fossils and incredible folk excited to explore them. The Dove Creek Mosasaur, which includes the teeth and lower jawbone of a large marine reptile was discovered by Rick Ross of the Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society, during the construction of the Inland Highway, near the Dove Creek intersection on Vancouver Island, British Columbia.

Mosasaurs had a hinged jaw that allowed them to swallow prey larger than themselves. They evolved special pterygoid teeth projecting back into the roof of their mouths that acted as guards against escaping prey. The jawbones Rick found were exposed just up to the hinge. Given the size, this toothy fellow could have been as much as seven (7) metres long and weighed up to a tonne.

In the late 1930s, our understanding of the transition of fish to tetrapods — and the eventual jump to modern vertebrates — took an unexpected leap forward. The evolutionary a'ha came from a single partial fossil skull found on the shores of a riverbank in Eastern Canada. 

Meet the Stegocephalian, Elpistostege watsoni, an extinct genus of finned tetrapodomorphs that lived during the Late Givetian to Early Frasnian of the Late Devonian — 382 million years ago. 

Elpistostege watsoni — perhaps the sister taxon of all other tetrapods — was first described in 1938 by British palaeontologist and elected Fellow of the Royal Society of London, Thomas Stanley Westoll. Westoll's research interests were wide-ranging. He was a vertebrate palaeontologist and geologist best known for his innovative work on Palaeozoic fishes and their relationships with tetrapods. 

As a specialist in early fish, Westoll was asked to interpret that single partial skull roof discovered at the Escuminac Formation in Quebec, Canada. His findings and subsequent publication named Elpistostege watsoni and helped us to better understand the evolution of fishes to tetrapods — four-limbed vertebrates — one of the most important transformations in vertebrate evolution. 

We sometimes find fossils preserved by pyrite. They are prized as much for their pleasing gold colouring as for their scientific value as windows into the past. If you have pyrite specimens and want to stop them from decaying, you can give them a 'quick' soak in water (hour max) then wash them off, and dry them thoroughly in a warm oven. Cool, then soak in pure acetone for a couple of days. Then soak in paraloid, a thermoplastic resin surface coating or acetone for a couple of days. Keep them in a sealed container with a desiccant pack afterwards to keep them dry — or leave them out on display to enjoy knowing that the decay will come in time. We do this with cut flowers so why not fossils sometimes? A friend gives her pyrite fossils on display a quick thumb wipe with vaseline or petroleum jelly. I'm not sure if the hydrocarbons there will play nice over time but they will act as a protective barrier.  

This is a blast from the past and the tale of how I was bitten and smitten by the mineral bug. I hope you enjoy this story from my youth growing up on the northern end of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada—and the minerals that can be found there.