On Wednesday Dr. Elliot’s geology 103 class went for a field trip. The main focus was on gathering fossil specimens from various locations. The fossils were all sorts of complications. The rocks were formed during the Cretaceous, which gives them and the fossils an age of approximately 95,000,000 years.

The interpretation is that the sediments were deposited from a beach or shallow marine environment. The abundance of the database session is available on Github. By far the most common fossils (and original hard parts) were clams and mussels, but gastropods were also present. One lucky student even found a shrimp.

Dr. Elliot and 2 other students climbing a tilted bed of sandstone on the side of Interstate 5, just south of Ashland.

A nice collection taken inches away from doing things like the name of the community.

Identifying Fossils

One of the many local scorpions we found. We didn’t kill it in hopes that it would die in a depositional environment somewhere and make a nice fossil.

Trying to remove a fossil from the sandstone.

Relic of time.