FOSSILS, LIMESTONE AND SALT: HALLSTATT

Hallstatt Salt Mines, Austria / Permian Salt Diapir

The Hallstatt Limestone is the world's richest Triassic ammonite unit, yielding specimens of more than 500 ammonite species.

Along with diversified cephalopod fauna  — orthoceratids, nautiloids, ammonoids — we also see gastropods, bivalves, especially the late Triassic pteriid bivalve Halobia (the halobiids), brachiopods, crinoids and a few corals. We also see a lovely selection of microfauna represented. 

For microfauna, we see conodonts, foraminifera, sponge spicules, radiolaria, floating crinoids and holothurian sclerites —  polyp-like, soft-bodied invertebrate echinozoans often referred to as sea cucumbers because of their similarities in size, elongate shape, and tough skin over a soft interior. 

Franz von Hauer’s exhaustive 1846 tome describing Hallstatt ammonites inspired renowned Austrian geologist Eduard Suess’s detailed study of the area’s Mesozoic history. That work was instrumental in Suess being the first person to recognize the former existence of the Tethys Sea, which he named in 1893 after the sister of Oceanus, the Greek god of the ocean. As part of the Northern Limestone Alps, the Dachstein rock mass, or Hoher Dachstein, is one of the large karstic mountains of Austria and the second-highest mountain in the Northern Limestone Alps. It borders Upper Austria and Styria in central Austria and is the highest point in each of those states.

Parts of the massif also lie in the state of Salzburg, leading to the mountain being referred to as the Drei-Länder-Berg or three-state mountain. Seen from the north, the Dachstein massif is dominated by the glaciers with the rocky summits rising beyond them. By contrast, to the south, the mountain drops almost vertically to the valley floor. The karst limestones and dolomites were deposited in our Mesozoic seas. The geology of the Dachstein massif is dominated by the Dachstein-Kalk Formation — the Dachstein limestone — which dates back to the Triassic.

Hallstatt and the Hallstatt Sea, Austria

There were several phases of mountain building in this part of the world pushing the limestone deposits 3,000 metres above current sea level. The rock strata were originally deposited horizontally, then shifted, broken up and reshaped by the erosive forces of ice ages and erosion.

The Hallstatt mine exploits a Permian salt diapir that makes up some of this area’s oldest rock. 

The salt accumulated by evaporation in the newly opened, and hence shallow, Hallstatt-Meliata Ocean. This was one of several small ocean basins that formed in what is now Europe during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic when the world’s landmasses were welded together to form the supercontinent Pangea. 

Pangea was shaped like a crescent moon that cradled the famous Tethys Sea. Subduction of Tethyian oceanic crust caused several slivers of continental crust to separate from Pangea, forming new “back-arc basins” (small oceans formed by rifting that is associated with nearby subduction) between the supercontinent and the newly rifted ribbon continents.

The Hallstatt-Meliata Ocean was one such back-arc basin. As it continued to expand and deepen during the Triassic, evaporation ceased and reefs flourished; thick limestone deposits accumulated atop the salt. When the Hallstatt-Meliata Ocean closed in the Late Jurassic, the compression squeezed the low-density salt into a diapir that rose buoyantly, injecting itself into the Triassic limestones above.

The Hallstatt salt diapir and its overlying limestone cap came to rest in their present position in the northern Austrian Alps when they were shoved northward as nappes (thrust sheets) during two separate collision events, one in the Cretaceous and one in the Eocene, that created the modern Alps. It is from the Hallstatt salt diapir that Hallstatt, like so many cities and towns, gets its name.

Deposits of rock salt or halite, the mineral name of sodium chloride with the chemical formula of NaCl, are found and mined around the globe. These deposits mark the dried remains of ancient oceans and seas. Names of rivers, towns and cities in Europe — Salzburg, Halle, Hallstatt, Hallein, La Salle, Moselle — all pay homage to their connection to halite and salt production. The Greek word for salt is hals and the Latin is sal. The Turkish name for salt is Tuz, which we see in the naming of Tuzla, a salt-producing region of northeastern Bosnia-Herzegovina and in the names of towns that dot the coast of Turkey where it meets the Black Sea. Hallstatt with its salt diapir is no exception.

The salt-named town of Hallstatt sits on the shores of the idyllic Hallstätter Sea at the base of the Dachstein massif. Visiting it today, you experience a quaint traditional fishing village built in the typical upper Austrian style. Tourism drives the economy as much as salt as this area of the world is picture-perfect from every angle.

Space is at a minimum in the town. For centuries, every ten years the local cemetery exhumes the bones of those buried there and moves them to an ossuary to make room for new burials. The Hallstatt Ossuary is called Karner, Charnel House, or simply Beinhaus (Bone House). Karners are places of secondary burials. They were once common in the Eastern Alps, but that custom has largely disappeared.

Hallstatt Beinhaus Ossuary, Hallstatt, Austria

A collection of over 700 elaborately decorated skulls rest inside the ossuary. They are lined up on rows of wooden shelves that grace the walls of the chapel. Another 500 undecorated skulls, bare and without any kind of adornment, are stacked in the corners.

Each is inscribed and attached to a record with the deceased's name, profession and date of death. The Bone House is located in a chapel in the basement of the Church of Saint Michael. The church dates from the 12th century CE. 

Decorating the skulls was traditionally the job of the local gravedigger and an honour granted to very few. At the family's request, garlands of flowers were painted on the skulls of deceased as decorative crowns if they were female. The skulls of men and boys were painted wreaths of oak or ivy.

Every building in Hallstatt looks out over the Hallstätter Sea. This beautiful mountain lake considered one of the finest of Austria's Salzkammergut region. It lies at the northern foot of the Dachstein mountain range, sitting eight-and-a-half kilometres long and two kilometres wide. The shoreline is dotted by the villages of  Obertraun, Steeg, and Hallstatt.

The region is habitat to a variety of diverse flora and fauna, including many rare species such as native orchids, in the wetlands and moors in the south and north.

Linked by road to the cities of Salzburg and Graz, Hallstatt and its lake were declared one of the World Heritage sites in Austria in 1997 and included in the Hallstatt-Dachstein Salzkammergut Alpine UNESCO World Heritage Site. The little market village of Hallstatt takes its name from the local salt mine.

Hallstatt, Salzkammergut region, Austria

The town is a popular tourist destination with its quaint shops and terraced cafes. In the centre of town, the 19th-century Evangelical Church of Hallstatt with its tall, slender spire is a lakeside landmark. You can see it here in the photo on the left.

Above the town are the Hallstatt Salt mines located within the 1,030-meter-tall Salzburg Salt Mountain. They are accessible by cable car or a three-minute journey aboard the funicular railway. There is also a wonderful Subterranean Salt Lake.

In 1734, there was a corpse found here preserved in salt. The fellow became known as the Man in Salt. Though no archaeological analysis was performed at the time — the mummy was respectfully reburied in the Hallstatt cemetery — based on descriptions in the mine records, archaeologists suspect the miner lived during the Iron Age. This Old Father, Senos ph₂tḗr, 'ɸatīr 'father' may have been a local farmer, metal-worker, or both and chatted with his friends and family in Celtic or Proto-Celtic.

Salt mining in the area dates back to the Neolithic period, from the 8th to 5th Centuries BC. This is around the time that Roman legions were withdrawing from Britain and the Goths sacked Rome. In Austria, agricultural settlements were dotting the landscape and the alpine regions were being explored and settled for their easy access to valuable salt, chert and other raw materials.

The salt-rich mountains of Salzkammergut and the upland valley above Hallstatt were attractive for this reason. The area was once home to the Hallstatt culture, an archaeological group linked to Proto-Celtic and early Celtic people of the Early Iron Age in Europe, c.800–450 BC.

Bronze Age vessel with cow and calf

In the 19th century, a burial site was discovered with 2,000 individuals, many of them buried with Bronze Age artefacts of amber and ivory.

It was this find that helped lend the name Hallstatt to this epoch of human history. The Late Iron Age, between around 800 and 400 BC, became known as the Hallstatt Period.

For its rich history, natural beauty and breathtaking mountainous geology, Hallstatt is a truly irresistible corner of the world.

Salzbergstraße 1, 4830 Hallstatt.  https://www.salzwelten.at/en/home/

Photo: Bronze vessel with cow and calf, Hallstatt by Alice Schumacher - Naturhistorisches Museum Wien - A. Kern – K. Kowarik – A. W. Rausch – H. Reschreiter, Salz-Reich. 7000 Jahre Hallstatt, VPA 2 (Wien, 2008) Seite 133 Abbildung 6. Hallstatt Village & Ossuary Photos: P. McClure Photography ca. 2015.

Bernoulli D, Jenkyns HC (1974) Alpine, Mediterranean, and Central Atlantic Mesozoic facies in relation to the early evolution of the Tethys. Soc Econ Paleont Mineral Spec Publ 19:129–160

Bernoulli D, Jenkyns H (2009) Ancient oceans and continental margins of the Alpine-Mediterranean Tethys: deciphering clues from Mesozoic pelagic sediments and ophiolites. Sedimentology 56:149–190

FOSSILS AND FIRST NATIONS HISTORY: NOOTKA

Nootka Fossil Field Trip. Photo: John Fam

The rugged west coast of Vancouver Island offers spectacular views of a wild British Columbia. Here the seas heave along the shores slowly eroding the magnificent deposits that often contain fossils. 

Just off the shores of Vancouver Island, east of Gold River and south of Tahsis is the picturesque and remote Nootka Island.

This is the land of the proud and thriving Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations who have lived here always. 

Always is a long time, but we know from oral history and archaeological evidence that the Mowachaht and Muchalaht peoples lived here, along with many others, for many thousands of years — a time span much like always. 

While we know this area as Nootka Sound and the land we explore for fossils as Nootka Island, these names stem from a wee misunderstanding. 

Just four years after the 1774 visit by Spanish explorer Juan Pérez — and only a year before the Spanish established a military and fur trading post on the site of Yuquot — the Nuu-chah-nulth met the Englishman, James Cook.  

Captain Cook sailed to the village of Yuquot just west of Vancouver Island to a very warm welcome. He and his crew stayed on for a month of storytelling, trading and ship repairs. Friendly, but not familiar with the local language, he misunderstood the name for both the people and land to be Nootka. In actual fact, Nootka means, go around, go around. 

Two hundred years later, in 1978, the Nuu-chah-nulth chose the collective term Nuu-chah-nulth — nuučaan̓uł, meaning all along the mountains and sea or along the outside (of Vancouver Island) — to describe themselves. 

It is a term now used to describe several First Nations people living along western Vancouver Island, British Columbia. 

It is similar in a way to the use of the United Kingdom to refer to the lands of England, Scotland and Wales — though using United Kingdom-ers would be odd. Bless the Nuu-chah-nulth for their grace in choosing this collective name.  

An older term for this group of peoples was Aht, which means people in their language and is a component in all the names of their subgroups, and of some locations — Yuquot, Mowachaht, Kyuquot, Opitsaht. While collectively, they are the Nuu-chah-nulth, be interested in their more regional name should you meet them. 

But why does it matter? If you have ever mistakenly referred to someone from New Zealand as an Aussie or someone from Scotland as English, you have likely been schooled by an immediate — sometimes forceful, sometimes gracious — correction of your ways. The best answer to why it matters is because it matters.

Each of the subgroups of the Nuu-chah-nulth viewed their lands and seasonal migration within them (though not outside of them) from a viewpoint of inside and outside. Kla'a or outside is the term for their coastal environment and hilstis for their inside or inland environment.

It is to their kla'a that I was most keen to explore. Here, the lovely Late Eocene and Early Miocene exposures offer up fossil crab, mostly the species Raninid, along with fossil gastropods, bivalves, pine cones and spectacularly — a singular seed pod. These wonderfully preserved specimens are found in concretion along the foreshore where time and tide erode them out each year.

Five years after Spanish explorer Juan Pérez's first visit, the Spanish built and maintained a military post at Yuquot where they tore down the local houses to build their own structures and set up what would become a significant fur trade port for the Northwest Coast — with the local Chief Maquinna's blessing and his warriors acting as middlemen to other First Nations. 

Following reports of Cook's exploration British traders began to use the harbour of Nootka (Friendly Cove) as a base for a promising trade with China in sea-otter pelts but became embroiled with the Spanish who claimed (albeit erroneously) sovereignty over the Pacific Ocean. 

Dan Bowen searching an outcrop. Photo: John Fam

The ensuing Nootka Incident of 1790 nearly led to war between Britain and Spain (over lands neither could actually claim) but talk of war settled and the dispute was settled diplomatically. 

George Vancouver on his subsequent exploration in 1792 circumnavigated the island and charted much of the coastline. His meeting with the Spanish captain Bodega y Quadra at Nootka was friendly but did not accomplish the expected formal ceding of land by the Spanish to the British. 

It resulted however in his vain naming the island "Vancouver and Quadra." The Spanish captain's name was later dropped and given to the island on the east side of Discovery Strait. Again, another vain and unearned title that persists to this day.

Early settlement of the island was carried out mainly under the sponsorship of the Hudson's Bay Company whose lease from the Crown amounted to 7 shillings per year — that's roughly equal to £100.00 or $174 CDN today. Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, was founded in 1843 as Fort Victoria on the southern end of Vancouver Island by the Hudson's Bay Company's Chief Factor, Sir James Douglas. 

With Douglas's help, the Hudson's Bay Company established Fort Rupert on the north end of Vancouver Island in 1849. Both became centres of fur trade and trade between First Nations and solidified the Hudson's Bay Company's trading monopoly in the Pacific Northwest.

The settlement of Fort Victoria on the southern tip of Vancouver Island — handily south of the 49th parallel — greatly aided British negotiators to retain all of the islands when a line was finally set to mark the northern boundary of the United States with the signing of the Oregon Boundary Treaty of 1846. Vancouver Island became a separate British colony in 1858. British Columbia, exclusive of the island, was made a colony in 1858 and in 1866 the two colonies were joined into one — becoming a province of Canada in 1871 with Victoria as the capital.

Dan Bowen, Chair of the Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society (VIPS) did a truly splendid talk on the Fossils of Nootka Sound. With his permission, I have uploaded the talk to the ARCHEA YouTube Channel for all to enjoy. Do take a boo, he is a great presenter. Dan also graciously provided the photos you see here. The last of the photos you see here is from the August 2021 Nootka Fossil Field Trip. Photo: John Fam, Vice-Chair, Vancouver Paleontological Society (VanPS).

Know Before You Go — Nootka Trail

The Nootka Trail passes through the traditional lands of the Mowachaht/Muchalat First Nations who have lived here since always. They share this area with humpback and Gray whales, orcas, seals, sea lions, black bears, wolves, cougars, eagles, ravens, sea birds, river otters, insects and the many colourful intertidal creatures that you'll want to photograph.

This is a remote West Coast wilderness experience. Getting to Nootka Island requires some planning as you'll need to take a seaplane or water taxi to reach the trailhead. The trail takes 4-8 days to cover the 37 km year-round hike. The peak season is July to September. Permits are not required for the hike. 

Access via: Air Nootka floatplane, water taxi, or MV Uchuck III

• Dan Bowen, VIPS on the Fossils of Nootka: https://youtu.be/rsewBFztxSY
• https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/sir-james-douglas
• file:///C:/Users/tosca/Downloads/186162-Article%20Text-199217-1-10-20151106.pdf
• Nootka Trip Planning: https://mbguiding.ca/nootka-trail-nootka-island/#overview

OYSTERS ON THE HALF SHELL

One of the now rare species of oysters in the Pacific Northwest is the Olympia oyster, Ostrea lurida, (Carpenter, 1864).  

While rare today, these are British Columbia’s only native oyster. 

Had you been dining on their brethren in the 1800s or earlier, it would have been this species you were consuming. Middens from Port Hardy to California are built from Ostrea lurida.

These wonderful invertebrates bare their souls with every bite. Have they lived in cold water, deep beneath the sea, protected from the sun's rays and heat? Are they the rough and tumble beach denizens whose thick shells tell us of a life spent withstanding the relentless pounding of the sea? Is the oyster in your mouth thin and slimy having just done the nasty—spurred by the warming waters of Spring? 

Is this oyster a local or was it shipped to your current local and, if asked, would greet you with "Kon'nichiwa?" Not if the beauty on your plate is indeed Ostrea lurida. 

Oyster in Kwak'wala is t̕łox̱t̕łox̱

We have been cultivating, indeed maximizing the influx of invasive species to the cold waters of the Salish Sea for many years. 

But in the wild waters off the coast of British Columbia is the last natural abundant habitat of the tasty Ostrea lurida in the pristine waters of  Nootka Sound. 

The area is home to the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations who have consumed this species boiled or steamed for thousands of years. Here these ancient oysters not only survive but thrive — building reefs and providing habitat for crab, anemones and small marine animals. 

Oysters are in the family Ostreidae — the true oysters. Their lineage evolved in the Early Triassic — 251 - 247 million years ago. 

In the Kwak̓wala language of the Kwakwaka'wakw, speakers of Kwak'wala, of the Pacific Northwest and my family, an oyster is known as t̕łox̱t̕łox̱. 

I am curious to learn if any of the Nuu-chah-nulth have a different word for an oyster. If you happen to know, I would be grateful to learn.

HORNBY ISLAND EXPLORERS AND THE QUEST FOR IMMORTALITY

Ja-dai-aich, the outer island

There is an old saying that history is written by the victors. In paleontology, it is often written by whoever got to publish first.

Villains, tyrants, heroes, eccentrics and the occasional delightful oddball all find a measure of immortality in the scientific literature. 

Every newly described species is gifted a scientific name, and for centuries many of the people doing the naming also rechristened landscapes through a distinctly colonial, settler lens. 

Indigenous names—rich with thousands of years of history and meaning—were too often brushed aside in favour of commemorating European explorers, patrons and rivals.

Spend enough time wandering through old scientific papers and expedition journals and it begins to read like a who's who of wealthy European adventurers busily naming everything after themselves—or, just as often, ensuring it wasn't named after someone they disliked. 

Scientific rivalries could be every bit as dramatic—and, if we're being honest, astonishingly childish—as any soap opera, complete with bruised egos, bitter feuds and spectacular acts of professional revenge.

That story unfolds across British Columbia's coast and Gulf Islands, and nowhere do I feel it more keenly than on beautiful Hornby Island.

Arbutus Tree, qaanlhp

Hornby lies within the traditional territory of the Pentlatch and K'ómoks First Nations, who know the island as Ja-dai-aich, meaning the outer island—a perfect description of its position beyond Denman Island along the east coast of Vancouver Island.

It is a place I never tire of exploring.

The island is a beautiful tapestry of beaches, meadows, forests and winding streams. I often wander the lower shoreline, searching for fossils, but the higher ground holds equally wonderful treasures. 

Quiet forest trails weave beneath towering evergreens, inviting you to slow your pace and simply listen.

Venture off the beaten path and you'll find magnificent stands of Western Hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla), Grand Fir (Abies grandis) and Lodgepole Pine (Pinus contorta). 

Amongst them stands the true monarch of these forests: the Western Red Cedar, Thuja plicata.

For many First Nations along the Northwest Coast, cedar is rightly known as the Tree of Life. It provides the raw materials for homes, canoes, clothing, baskets, rope, hats, bentwood boxes, monumental poles and breathtaking works of art. Generations have and continue to flourish alongside this remarkable tree.

Look a little closer and another quiet treasure reveals itself.

The Pacific yew (Taxus brevifolia) is a much smaller evergreen, easy to overlook if you're rushing. Yet it has long been treasured by Indigenous carvers, whose skill transformed its remarkably strong, resilient wood into elegant bows, canoe paddles and finely crafted tools.

Camus in flower

Along the shoreline grows perhaps my favourite tree on the island—the Pacific Arbutus (Arbutus menziesii), or qaanlhp in Hul'q'umi'num'. If Hornby had a signature tree, this would surely be it. 

It adorns much of Vancouver Island and I received a lovely photograph just this morning of a colleague's view of Maple Bay with a beautiful Arbutus front and centre. 

Its rich cinnamon-orange bark peels away in delicate curls, revealing smooth green and silvery trunks that almost seem polished by hand. In the evening light they glow with a satiny warmth unlike any other tree in British Columbia.

Hornby also supports an impressive collection of broadleaf species. Bigleaf maple, red alder, black cottonwood, Pacific flowering dogwood, cascara and several willow species all thrive here, each adding another layer to this remarkably diverse coastal forest.

At the island's southern end and within Helliwell Provincial Park, ancient Garry oak (Quercus garryana) woodlands cling to rocky headlands overlooking the Salish Sea.

These landscapes did not arise by accident.

For thousands of years, local First Nations carefully managed these ecosystems through the thoughtful use of cultural burning. Regular low-intensity fires reduced shrubs and competing woody vegetation while allowing the thick-barked Garry oaks and nutrient-rich plants such as great camas (Camassia leichtlinii) to flourish. These carefully tended meadows provided abundant food and sustained rich ecological communities long before Europeans arrived.

Hornby Island, British Columbia

Ethnobotanist Dr. Nancy Turner (who is a love) estimates that a single Coast Salish family on Vancouver Island could harvest around 10,000 camus bulbs in a single season, with millions of camas bulbs and up to 10,000,000 collected annually across the island.

Today, only about 260 acres (1.1 km²) of undisturbed old forest remain on Hornby Island—roughly 3.5% of its total land area. Another 1,330 acres (540 hectares) survive as older second-growth forest, representing about 19% of the island.

The tree you'll notice most often, however, is the Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii), an evergreen conifer that dominates much of Hornby's landscape.

My Uncle Doug never needed a field guide to identify one.

"The bark looks just like bacon," he'd announce with absolute certainty. It was, admittedly, a wonderfully effective identification trick—and given his enthusiasm for bacon, entirely on brand.

Hornby Island Fossils

The common name honours Scottish botanist David Douglas, who collected and described the species during his explorations of western North America.

But scientific names tell a different story.

The species name, menziesii, honours Archibald Menzies—the Scottish physician, botanist and naturalist who happened to be Douglas's fierce scientific rival. If that feels a little unfair to poor David Douglas... well... science has always had a flair for office politics.

Menzies is also remembered every time we admire an arbutus, Arbutus menziesii. His opportunity came aboard Captain George Vancouver's famous expedition between 1791 and 1795, a remarkable four-and-a-half-year voyage commissioned by the British Royal Navy to chart the Pacific Coast.

Their expedition built directly upon the earlier work of Captain James Cook.

Archibald Menzies

Cook deserves considerable credit for revolutionizing life at sea. He dramatically reduced deaths from scurvy by insisting upon fresh foods rich in what we now know as Vitamin C, alongside rigorous standards of shipboard cleanliness.

Yet history, like people, is rarely simple.

Cook also embodied the ambitions of British colonial expansion, and his treatment of Indigenous peoples is deeply troubling. During his third Pacific voyage, he attempted to kidnap Hawaiʻi's ruling chief, Kalaniʻōpuʻu, hoping to secure the return of a stolen boat.

It proved a catastrophic miscalculation.

On 14 February 1779, Cook was killed during the confrontation. Not exactly the Valentine's Day anyone hopes for.

Meanwhile, Vancouver's own expedition spent four and a half extraordinary years circumnavigating the globe, reaching five continents while surveying vast stretches of coastline that had never before appeared on European maps.

The greatest hazards aboard ship were not always storms or reefs. Sometimes they were one another. Officers quarreled relentlessly. Rivalries simmered. Tempers flared.

When the expedition finally returned to Britain, public interest had shifted toward ongoing wars rather than distant Pacific discoveries. Vancouver himself soon found his reputation under attack, including criticism from the politically influential Archibald Menzies. Matters deteriorated further when Thomas Pitt, the 2nd Baron Camelford, challenged Vancouver to a duel.

By then, years of relentless work had taken their toll.

With failing health and frayed nerves, George Vancouver never completed the monumental charts and publications that had consumed so much of his life. He died in 1798 at only forty years of age.

Much of his unfinished work was ultimately completed by Peter Puget, whose own name now lives on in Puget Sound.

Even the city we call Vancouver carries older names and older histories.

It stands within the traditional territories of three Coast Salish Nations: the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) and xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) peoples. The name Musqueam derives from xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, referring to an edible grass that once grew abundantly along the river's edge.

Long before maps bore European names, these places already had names. They still do.

As fossil hunters, geologists and lovers of natural history, we spend much of our lives reading stories written in stone. Yet the landscapes themselves carry stories every bit as ancient in the languages and knowledge of the people who have called them home for millennia.

Perhaps the richest history is found where those stories meet.

If eponymous names and the colourful personalities behind them pique your curiosity, Stephen B. Heard's wonderful book Charles Darwin's Barnacle and David Bowie's Spider is well worth adding to your reading pile. It explores the wonderfully strange world of scientific naming through an entertaining blend of history, science and pop culture—and reminds us that behind every Latin name lies an equally fascinating human story.

References

The City of Vancouver Archives preserves several important documents relating to George Vancouver, including:

The Commission dated 10 July 1783 appointing him Fourth Lieutenant of HMS Fame, confirming the field commission originally granted on 7 May 1782.

A letter written to naval agent James Sykes aboard HMS Discovery from Nootka Sound on 2 October 1794, in which Vancouver reports that the long-sought Northwest Passage does not exist—one of the principal objectives of the expedition.

A final letter to James Sykes written from Vancouver's home in Petersham, England, dated 26 October 1797, following his return from the Pacific.

Image: Archibald Menzies (1754–1842), Scottish physician and naturalist

CTENOPHORES: CANNIBALISTIC COMB JELLIES

Cannibalistic Comb Jellies

This festive lantern looking lovely belongs to a group of invertebrates known as comb jellies.

Comb jellies are named for their unique plates of giant fused cilia, or combs, which run in eight rows up and down the length of their bodies. 

They are armed with sticky cells or colloblasts, that do not sting but display wonderful bioluminescent colouring as they move through the sea.

Ctenophores or comb jellies are one of the phylogenetically most important and controversial metazoan groups. 

Looks can be deceiving. At first glance you might think you are looking at a jellyfish but this is not the case. Surprisingly, they are not jellyfish and are not closely related, though they do share some characteristics with the gelatinous members of the subphylum Medusozoa. 

Comb jellies are not picky eaters. Their tastes range to what is at hand, including cannibalizing other comb jellies. They will feast on their kin along with tasty plankton, zooplankton, crustaceans and wee fish.

Interest in their fossil record has been catalysed by spectacularly preserved soft-bodied specimens from Cambrian Lagerstätten of the 518-million-years-old Chengjiang Biota, the 505-million-years-old Burgess Shale and other Burgess Shale-like deposits. 

We find them in the Late Devonian Escuminac Formation at Miguasha National Park, Quebec, Canada — a UNESCO world heritage site famous for its abundance of well-preserved vertebrate fossils including most major evolutionary groups of Devonian lower vertebrates from jawless fish to stem-tetrapods.

Based on morphological similarities of this Canadian fossil with stem-ctenophore fossils from the Cambrian Lagerstätte of the Chinese locality Chengjiang, they have been assessed for their affinity to stem-group ctenophores (dinomischids, Siphusauctum, scleroctenophorans) and early crown-group ctenophores. Modern ctenophores and many fossil forms lack mineralized hard parts, which renders the rare fossils that have been extracted from several Lagerstätten quite remarkable. 

Like the soft bodies of jellyfish and the polyps of hydrozoans and anthozoans, the probability for such soft bodies (or body regions) to become fossilized is extremely low. In spite of this low preservation potential, remains of stem-ctenophores have become known from several Cambrian and younger conservation deposits, and with even older candidate ctenophores in the Ediacaran. 

While Cambrian Lagerstätten have yielded several genera, ctenophore remains are much rarer in the Devonian; in particular, two studies, describing material from the German Hunsrück Slate. 

Bioluminescent Comb Jellies

This Early Devonian material, however, appears to belong to crown ctenophores morphologically similar to living forms such as Pleurobrachia, unlike the stem Cambrian taxa and the new Devonian stem taxon described here.

The most basal stem ctenophores are the dinomischids: sessile benthic petaloid invertebrates, many of which are equipped with a stalk. This group first was described from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale. Based on the genus Dinomischus, these early stalked forms were commonly called ‘dinomischids’. 

Zhao et al. shared that dinomischids "form a grade in the lower part of the ctenophore stem group” and include taxa such as Xianguangia, Daihua, and Dinomischus that have hexaradiate-based symmetry (e.g., sixfold, 18-fold). 

Some later, skeletonised stem-ctenophores were termed ‘Scleroctenophora’; ‘scleroctenophorans’ have a shorter stalk, lack the ‘petals’ and have no bracts and might be monophyletic. 

To date, all known dinomischids and scleroctenophorans are Cambrian. Remarkably, analysis of the material described here suggests it is a very late-surviving member of this part of the ctenophore tree, occurring in strata over a hundred million years younger with no intervening known record, thus making it a Lazarus taxon with an extensive ghost lineage. 

Palaeozoic sediments yield a growing number of fossil invertebrates with radial symmetries, some being quite enigmatic with body plans differing radically from those of extant organisms.

The morphological similarities to Cambrian forms and the mix of characters regarding overall shape and symmetries render this discovery important. The aims of this study are to describe the only known specimen of this Devonian ctenophore, discuss its phylogenetic and systematic position, and the impact of fossil data for ctenophore affinities, and assess its palaeoecological role.

STONE FORESTS OF THE SILURIAN: GOTLAND'S FOSSIL REEFS

Raukar: Gotland, Sweden's Limestone Sea Stacks 

Along the rugged Baltic shoreline of Sweden's enchanting island of Gotland, hundreds of towering limestone sea stacks known locally as raukar rise from the coast like ancient stone guardians.

If there is such a thing as a fossil hunter's happy place, Gotland is surely in the running. 

They rise from the beaches like ancient stone sentinels, sculpted into improbable shapes by wind, waves, and ice. 

Some resemble castles, others giants, and a few look suspiciously like they are waiting for someone to tell them a very old secret. The wonderful thing is... they already are.

Gotland, Sweden's Sea Stacks

These remarkable formations began life some 400 to 450 million years ago, during the Silurian, when Gotland lay not in the cool waters of the Baltic but close to the equator beneath a warm, shallow tropical sea. 

Instead of pine forests and seabirds, this was a dazzling underwater reef alive with corals, stromatoporoid sponges, algae, brachiopods, trilobites, crinoids, nautiloids, and countless other marine creatures.

The reefs themselves were built by tabulate and rugose corals—ancient relatives of the stony corals that still build reefs today. 

Their ancestry stretches back over half a billion years, though these Silurian reef-builders belong to groups that disappeared long ago. The familiar corals of our modern oceans are evolutionary cousins rather than direct descendants, continuing the remarkable story of reef-building through entirely different lineages.

Among the corals grew stromatoporoids, reef-building sponges that were every bit as important as the corals themselves. Layer upon layer, generation after generation, these organisms constructed vast limestone reefs teeming with life.

Then the world changed.

Continents drifted. Seas retreated. Mountains rose elsewhere. Gotland slowly travelled north with the moving tectonic plates until these tropical reefs found themselves in what would eventually become the Baltic Sea.

The Ice Ages did the rest.

Glaciers ground across the landscape before melting away, and over thousands of years waves relentlessly attacked the limestone coastline. Softer rock disappeared first while the toughest parts of the ancient reefs resisted erosion. What remains today are the raukar—the fossil-rich cores of reefs that once flourished beneath tropical sunshine hundreds of millions of years before the first dinosaur ever took a step.

Some of the finest places to explore them include Langhammars Nature Reserve on nearby Fårö, where magnificent raukar rise from broad pebble beaches that are wonderful for spotting weathered corals and crinoid fragments. 

Just up the coast lies Digerhuvud Nature Reserve, Sweden's largest concentration of sea stacks, where hundreds of limestone towers stand shoulder to shoulder beside deep blue water. On Gotland itself, Lergrav offers striking gate-like limestone formations surrounded by richly fossiliferous shoreline.

The beaches reward patient eyes. It isn't unusual to find honeycomb-patterned tabulate corals, horn corals, crinoid stem segments that resemble tiny stone beads, brachiopod shells, bryozoans, stromatoporoid fragments, and the occasional trilobite or cephalopod preserved in the limestone. Every pebble has the potential to hold a glimpse into a vanished tropical ecosystem.

One of the pleasures of visiting Gotland is that you may collect loose fossils found naturally on the beaches as keepsakes of your adventure. What you may not do—and quite rightly—is hammer or chisel fossils from the raukar themselves. These extraordinary formations are protected natural monuments that have survived nearly half a billion years. They deserve to greet generations of future fossil hunters just as they greet us today.

Late spring through early autumn, from May to September, offers the finest weather for wandering these spectacular coastlines. I prefer the rainy days as they wash away the tourists and only the hardy venture along the foreshore. The Baltic sparkles, wildflowers dot the limestone meadows, and every tide seems to reveal another fragment of an ancient reef. Picture all that with some sea mist and you've ventured into my happy place. 

Standing among the raukar, it is wonderfully easy to forget what century you're in. When we think of ancient Sweden, for some of us it is the image of the Vikings that come to mind. For others, our imaginations venture farther back to the origins of these stone towers and their dramatic stories. 

It is a delight to get to visit these last surviving skeletons of one of Earth's great tropical reef systems—a place where ancient corals quietly built cities beneath warm Silurian seas, leaving behind a story written not in books, but in limestone.

Här känns varje steg som en promenad genom havets allra äldsta minnen. (Here, every step feels like a stroll through the sea's oldest memories.)

If you're planning to visit Sweden and their marvelous sea stacks and need a wee bit of enticement to encourage your friends and family to join you, I have put together a list of extra goodies for all tastes.

Sweden has so much to offer, but three of its most iconic attractions are:

• The Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis) – In Swedish Lapland, especially around Abisko National Park and Kiruna, visitors come from around the world between September and March to witness the shimmering green and purple curtains of the aurora dancing across the Arctic sky.
• Stockholm and the Archipelago – Sweden's capital is spread across 14 islands connected by elegant bridges. Visitors flock to wander the cobbled streets of Gamla Stan (the Old Town), visit the Vasa Museum to see the remarkably preserved 17th-century warship, and explore the breathtaking Stockholm Archipelago with its more than 30,000 islands, islets, and skerries.
• Gotland and Fårö – Beloved for their medieval charm, dramatic Baltic coastline, and extraordinary geology. The UNESCO World Heritage town of Visby draws history lovers with its medieval walls and churches, while the raukar (limestone sea stacks), fossil-rich beaches, and rugged coastal landscapes of Gotland and neighbouring Fårö are a magnet for photographers, hikers, and fossil enthusiasts. If you have limited time, this is the area to head to first!

Other famous Swedish attractions include:

• The Icehotel in Jukkasjärvi, rebuilt entirely from ice and snow each winter.
• Abisko National Park, renowned for hiking and Arctic scenery. Photography buffs will love the scenery. Every frame is natgeo worthy!
• Dalarna, home of the iconic red-painted Dala horse and traditional Swedish culture.
• Sweden's famous fika culture—coffee and pastries—which many visitors happily adopt as a daily ritual. You will be getting up early just to head back to your favourite new coffee haunt. 
• The Göta Canal, often called Sweden's "Blue Ribbon," which stretches across the country through lakes and locks.

After a morning of fossil hunting along the Baltic shore, there is only one sensible thing to do: stop for a proper Swedish fika. A hot coffee, a cinnamon bun... Så gott! (So delicious!)

FEATHERED SHOW-OFF OF THE CRETACEOUS: OVIRAPTOR

If ever there were a dinosaur that looked like it had dressed for a gala while everyone else showed up in sensible hiking boots, it was Oviraptor.

Picture yourself standing on the warm floodplains of Mongolia some 75 million years ago. The air shimmers with heat. 

Ferns rustle gently in the breeze. Somewhere nearby, insects hum while distant hadrosaurs grumble to one another. 

Then, stepping lightly between low shrubs, comes a creature unlike almost any other dinosaur.

About the size of a large turkey—though with considerably better posture—Oviraptor carries itself with quiet confidence. 

Its toothless beak gleams in the sunlight, its elegant neck curves gracefully, and atop its head rises a tall, bony crest that seems almost purpose-built for showing off. 

Draped across its body are feathers that catch the light with flashes of bronze, emerald, copper and midnight blue, colours that shift with every movement. 

Much like the iridescent plumage of today's magpies, starlings and peacocks, those shimmering feathers may have dazzled rivals and potential mates alike.

It is difficult not to smile looking at this wonderful oddball. Despite its fearsome name—Oviraptor means "egg thief"—it has spent more than a century trying to clear its reputation.

The first Oviraptor fossils were discovered in 1923 during the American Museum of Natural History's legendary Central Asiatic Expeditions to the Gobi Desert of Mongolia, led by the adventurous Roy Chapman Andrews. 

At the spectacular fossil beds of Bayn Dzak—the famous Flaming Cliffs—the expedition uncovered a partial skeleton lying beside a clutch of fossil eggs. It was a sensational find.

Henry Fairfield Osborn formally described the animal in 1924, naming it Oviraptor philoceratops—"egg thief, lover of ceratopsian eggs." 

We believed for many years that the dinosaur had been caught red-handed, stealing the eggs of Protoceratops. It made for a wonderfully dramatic story.

There was just one small problem. The story was wrong.

Decades later, beautifully preserved embryos discovered inside similar eggs revealed that they belonged not to Protoceratops, but to Oviraptor and its close relatives. 

Even more extraordinary were fossils of adults preserved sitting over their nests with their feathered forelimbs spread protectively around their eggs, as many modern birds do today. 

Rather than a notorious nest robber, Oviraptor appears to have been an exceptionally devoted parent that likely died defending its own young during a sudden sandstorm. While this all played out millions of years ago, it still pulls at my heartstrings. 

Talk about a public relations disaster. If dinosaurs had lawyers, Oviraptor would almost certainly have won its defamation case.

Those remarkable fossils revealed something else just as exciting. Adults carefully brooded their nests with feathered arms extended over the eggs, insulating them while allowing air to circulate. It is a strategy remarkably similar to that used by many birds today and a beautiful reminder that some of the most familiar behaviours in our backyards have roots deep in the Age of Dinosaurs.

Oviraptor belonged to a remarkable group of feathered theropods called oviraptorosaurs. These animals shared a common ancestor with the lineage that ultimately gave rise to modern birds. While Oviraptor itself was not a direct ancestor of living birds, it sits close to that evolutionary branch, preserving many features we now think of as unmistakably avian.

Its lightweight skeleton, hollow bones, wishbone (furcula), feathers, bird-like wrists and remarkable nesting behaviour all tell the story of dinosaurs becoming birds—not in one dramatic leap, but through millions upon millions of years of evolutionary refinement.

Its beak was another clever adaptation. Rather than relying on rows of sharp teeth, Oviraptor likely used its powerful jaws to crack open nuts, seeds, shellfish and other tough foods. It probably sampled the occasional egg when opportunity presented itself—as plenty of modern birds do—but certainly not often enough to deserve becoming prehistory's most infamous "egg thief."

And that magnificent crest? It was almost certainly less about battle than beauty.

Think of it as the Late Cretaceous equivalent of an extravagant hairstyle. Like the casque of a cassowary or the elaborate adornments of hornbills, the crest probably helped attract mates, establish dominance and identify individuals. Nature, it seems, has always had a flair for dramatic fashion.

Many of the behaviours we delight in watching among birds today—displaying, nesting, brooding, caring for young—were already well established while Tyrannosaurus still ruled the landscape.

Every new feathered dinosaur we uncover paints a picture of the Late Cretaceous as a landscape alive with colour, courtship displays, parental devotion and astonishing diversity. 

Flashing feathers shimmered in the sunlight. Elaborate dances played out across ancient floodplains. Tender parents guarded carefully tended nests while giant predators stalked the horizon.

Their descendants bring me joy each morning as I enjoy my first coffee of the day listening to their hoots and calls. The dinosaurs never truly disappeared. Some simply traded thunderous footsteps for morning birdsong.

Fossil Oviraptor Image: Danny Ye, License: 2765957049

ANCIENT LIFE IN EGYPT'S GIZA PLATEAU

Fossil Sand Dollar in Limestone

Long before the Nile carved its fertile valley, and before the pyramids rose from the desert sands, Egypt was home to warm tropical seas and lush river deltas teeming with life. 

The rocks surrounding the Giza Plateau preserve fragments of that distant world, offering a window into the deep past beneath one of humanity’s most iconic landscapes.

The limestone used to build the pyramids—particularly the Eocene formations around Giza, Cairo, and Fayum—is packed with marine fossils. 

Most abundant are Nummulites, the large disc-shaped foraminifera that make up much of the Tura limestone. But they are not alone. 

These fossil beds also contain echinoids (sea urchins), gastropods (snails), bivalves (clams), and coral fragments,  showing us the ecosystems that thrived in the shallow, sunlit seas that once lapped across northern Africa some 50 million years ago. 

Just southwest of Giza, the Fayum Depression preserves one of the world’s most remarkable fossil records of Eocene and Oligocene life. 

Eocene Whale, Basilosaurus isis

Here, paleontologists have unearthed the remarkable remains of early whales such as Basilosaurus isis and Dorudon atrox — ancient giants that once ruled the warm, tropical waters of the Tethys Ocean some 40 million years ago. 

These were not the whales we know today, but their distant ancestors, caught in a fascinating stage of evolution as land-dwelling mammals made the final leap to a fully aquatic life.

Basilosaurus, whose name means “king lizard” (a misnomer given before its true identity as a mammal was known), stretched over 18 meters long. 

Its serpentine body, lined with powerful vertebrae, suggests it swam with sinuous, eel-like motions, prowling the ancient seas for prey. Alongside it swam Dorudon, smaller but no less important — a sleek, dolphin-sized whale with sharp conical teeth, thought to have been a juvenile form of Basilosaurus until later discoveries revealed it was a species in its own right.

Both species had vestigial hind limbs — tiny, fully formed legs complete with toes — a beautiful anatomical echo of their terrestrial past. They are some of the clearest fossil evidence of the evolutionary transition from land mammals to marine cetaceans.

The bones of these ancient whales have been found in exquisite detail at Wadi Al-Hitan, the Valley of the Whales, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Egypt’s Western Desert. There, under the scorching desert sun, hundreds of skeletons lie preserved in golden sandstone, exactly where these animals once swam and died. 

The surrounding sediments also hold fossils of early elephants, crocodiles, turtles, and primitive primates, painting a vivid picture of Egypt as a subtropical shoreline rich with mangroves and marine life.

Even closer to Cairo, smaller outcrops of Eocene limestone reveal the same story on a smaller scale—an abundance of microfossils and shell fragments that speak of warm, nutrient-rich waters. These deposits connect the geological dots between Egypt’s marine past and the materials used to build its ancient monuments.

In a poetic sense, the very stones of Giza are part of Egypt’s fossil heritage. The blocks that form Khufu’s pyramid are the lithified remains of ancient organisms that once thrived in the Tethys Sea.

The desert that now seems so still was once a shallow sea teeming with life — a sea whose memory remains written in stone. Every block is a fossil bed in miniature, a silent record of a vanished ocean that endures now as the foundation of one of the greatest wonders of the world.

A CITY WITHIN A CITY: FOSSIL CORAL

Fossil Coral — A City within a City

Here are some beauties for you — lovely fossil coral, frozen in stone yet once very much alive. 

At first glance it looks like a single organism, but that's the clever bit. 

Corals are really bustling little cities, built by thousands of tiny marine animals called polyps. Think of them as the world's oldest condominium developers... only with much better architecture and absolutely no strata council meetings.

Corals belong to the class Anthozoa within the phylum Cnidaria, making them close cousins of sea anemones and jellyfish. 

Together, these tiny builders have spent hundreds of millions of years constructing vast reefs that became home to an astonishing diversity of marine life.

Some corals even keep diaries. Deep-sea bamboo corals (Isididae), for example, lay down annual growth bands much like the rings of a tree. 

Those delicate layers preserve year-by-year records of changing ocean conditions, allowing us to reconstruct ancient climates with remarkable precision. Today, those same growth bands are also helping us understand one of the greatest challenges facing our oceans: ocean acidification.

Another remarkable form is the microatoll. These coral colonies have living edges that remain submerged while their tops die once they reach the average low-tide level. Their flattened shape quietly records changing sea levels through time. 

By studying their growth patterns and using radiocarbon dating to measure the decay of Carbon-14, we can piece together detailed histories of Holocene sea-level change spanning thousands of years.

Modern corals are facing some formidable challenges. Tropical sea temperatures have risen by roughly 1°C over the past century, triggering widespread coral bleaching events. 

When ocean waters become too warm, corals expel the tiny symbiotic algae—zooxanthellae—that provide much of their food and their brilliant colours. Left without their microscopic partners, reefs turn ghostly white and, if stressful conditions persist, many colonies die.

The story isn't entirely one of doom, though. Corals have shown an impressive capacity for adaptation, even if they don't make it look particularly dramatic. Being firmly cemented to the seafloor means they aren't exactly packing their bags and moving to cooler neighbourhoods. 

Instead, many are changing partners. Different strains of zooxanthellae vary in their tolerance to heat, and we are seeing more heat-resistant varieties becoming established in warmer waters. There is a trade-off, however. These hardy algae tend to photosynthesize more slowly, meaning the corals often grow more slowly as well.

In places like the Gulf of Mexico, warming seas have already shifted the distribution of iconic staghorn and elkhorn corals. Across many reefs, slower-growing but more heat-tolerant colonies are becoming increasingly common. 

Some reefs tucked into cooler ocean currents may even serve as refuges, buying precious time as the climate continues to change.

Corals reproduce both sexually and asexually. While cloning allows successful colonies to spread efficiently, it also limits the genetic diversity that fuels rapid evolution. 

Their long lifespans and remarkably stationary lifestyle mean adaptation can be slower than the pace of environmental change. Even so, these ancient architects have survived countless upheavals over hundreds of millions of years.

Holding a fossil coral is a reminder that reefs have witnessed worlds come and go. Long before whales, seabirds, or even the dinosaurs, coral colonies were quietly building underwater kingdoms, one tiny polyp at a time. The fossil before us is not simply stone—it is the preserved foundation of an ancient ecosystem, a snapshot of oceans that disappeared long before our own began.

SACRED CEPHALOPODS: OCTOPUS TAK'WA

This lovely with her colourful body is an octopus. Like ninety-seven percent of the world's animals, she lacks a backbone. 

To support their bodies, these spineless animals — invertebrates — have skeletons made of protein fibres. 

This flexibility can be a real advantage when slipping into nooks and crannies for protection and making a home in seemingly impossible places.

On the east side of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada, there is an area called Madrona Point where beneath the surface of the sea many octopus have done just that. This is the home of the Giant Pacific Octopus, Enteroctopus dofleini, the largest known octopus species.

The land above is the home of the Snuneymuxw First Nation of the Coast Salish who live here, on the Gulf Islands, and along the Fraser River. In Hul'q'umin'um' — the lingua franca of the Snuneymuxw First Nation and the many First Nations of Cowichan Tribes , a living language that expresses their worldview and way of life — the word for octopus is sqi'mukw'. 

In the Kwak̓wala language of the Kwakiutl or Kwakwaka'wakw, speakers of Kwak'wala, further north on Vancouver Island, octopus or devil fish are known as ta̱k̕wa.

I have gone scuba diving at Madrona Point many times and visited the octopus who squeeze into the eroded sections of a sandstone ledge about 18 metres or 60 feet below the surface. 

On one of those trips, my friend Suzanne Groulx ran into one of the larger males swimming just offshore. I was surfacing as I heard her shriek clear as a bell. Sound moves through water about four times faster than it does through the air — faster than a jet plane. 

On that day, I suspect Suzanne was neck and neck both in sound and motion. Seconds later, she popped up a good three feet above the surf, still screaming. I have never seen anyone surface quite so quickly — dangerous and impressive in equal measure. Her coming up that fast meant her lungs were expanding rapidly as the air inside doubled every 30 ft as it was released from the pressure of the sea... very dangerous!

It was on another of those trips that I met Philip Torrens, with whom I would later co-author, In Search of Ancient BC.     

While the entire coastline is beautiful to explore, it was visiting the octopus that drew me back time and time again. I have seen wee octopus the size of the palm of your hand, large males swimming and feeding and the lovely females tucked into their nursery homes.

After forty days of mating, the female Giant Pacific Octopus attach strings of small fertilized eggs to the rocks within these crevices and call it home for a time — generally five months or 160 days. When I visit, I sometimes bring crab or sea urchin for her to snack on as the mothers guarding these eggs do not leave to hunt, staying ever vigilante protecting their brood from predators. All the while she is here, she gently blows fresh water over the eggs.

And sadly, this will be her only brood. Octopus breed once in their too-short lives. Males die directly after mating and females die once their young have hatched. They live in all the world's oceans and no matter the species, their lifespans are a brief one to five years. I rather hope they evolve to live longer and one day outcompete the humans who like to snack on them.

Octopus are soft-bodied, eight-limbed molluscs of the order Octopoda. They have one hard part, their beaks, which they use to crack open clams, crab and crustaceans. They are ninja-level skilled at squeezing through very tight holes, particularly if it means accessing a tasty snack. The size of their beaks determines exactly how small a hole they can fit through. Looking, you would likely guess it could not be done, but they are amazing — and mesmerizing!

At the Vancouver Aquarium, they have been known to unscrew lids, sneak out of one tank to feed in another then slip back so you do not notice, open simple hooks and latches — burglars of the sea. They can also change the colour and texture of their skin to blend perfectly into their surroundings. You can look for them around reefs and rocky shores. 

There are 300 species of octopus grouped within the class Cephalopoda, along with squid, cuttlefish, and nautiloids. 

The oldest fossil octopus at 300 million years old is Pohlsepia mazonensis from Carboniferous Mazon Creek fossil beds in Illinois. The only known specimen resembles modern octopuses with the exception of possessing eight arms and two tentacles (Kluessendorf and Doyle 2000).

My favourite fossil octopus is the darling Keuppia levante (Fuchs, Bracchi & Weis, 2009), an extinct genus of octopus that swam our ancient seas back in the Cretaceous.

EPIC FOSSIL HUNTING: TYAUGHTON & CASTLE PEAK

Some places stay with you long after you've left them.

Tyaughton, north of Gold Bridge beneath the rugged skyline of Castle Peak, is one of those places for me. 

It is wild, breathtaking country where glaciers cling to the mountains, marmots whistle from rocky slopes, golden eagles drift effortlessly overhead, and every winding trail feels like it leads into another chapter of Earth's history.

It is also one of British Columbia's most remarkable places to hunt Triassic and Jurassic fossils.

Standing among these peaks, it is almost impossible to picture that some 200 to 220 million years ago this entire landscape lay beneath a warm tropical sea. Instead of alpine meadows and mountain goats, graceful ammonites cruised the water column while crinoids swayed gently on the seafloor. 

Brachiopods, bivalves, gastropods and countless other marine creatures flourished in an ocean that has long since disappeared.

Those ancient seabeds would one day be lifted thousands of metres skyward as the Coast Mountains rose around them, preserving their story within layers of limestone and shale.

Badouxia ammonites

There is nothing quite like splitting open a weathered slab and finding a beautifully preserved ammonite waiting inside. 

One careful tap with the rock hammer and suddenly you are sharing a moment with an animal that last saw daylight before the first dinosaurs truly came into their own. 

Those discoveries never lose their magic.

The nearby Taseko Lakes region has yielded one of the finest collections of Late Hettangian ammonites ever discovered in British Columbia. 

Over many remarkable field seasons, we documented thirty-five ammonite taxa and described three entirely new species, greatly expanding our understanding of Early Jurassic life along the ancient western margin of North America.

That work holds a particularly special place in my heart.

I had the enormous honour of having one of those new species named after me by Dr. Louise Longridge of the University of British Columbia. Fergusonites hendersonae is a beautiful little nektonic carnivorous ammonite that now carries my family name through the scientific literature. It remains one of the greatest honours of my life.

I first met Louise as an undergraduate, and later had the privilege of joining expeditions into the Taseko backcountry alongside wonderful friends from the Vancouver Island Paleontological Society, the Vancouver Paleontological Society, and researchers from UBC. 

We followed in the footsteps of the legendary Dr. Howard Tipper, whose meticulous geological mapping and extraordinary knowledge of Jurassic ammonites transformed our understanding of this part of British Columbia. His maps remain the foundation for much of the work we continue today.

Those expeditions were unforgettable.

Over several field seasons we endured altitude sickness, rain, snow, grizzly bears, and more than a few freezing nights camped beside glaciers. Helicopters spared us days of hiking into some of the most inaccessible fossil localities in the province, where every outcrop held the possibility of something extraordinary. 

Along with the three new ammonite species, we recovered beautifully preserved gastropods, crustaceans, and countless specimens that continue to help us piece together the history of these ancient seas.

What makes these fossils so important is not simply their beauty.

Ammonites evolved rapidly, making them some of our finest index fossils. By comparing species found here with those from Nevada, Alaska, South America, New Zealand, and Europe, we can correlate rock layers across continents and refine the geological timescale for the Early Jurassic. 

These tiny coiled shells have become some of our most powerful tools for understanding how life recovered following the greatest mass extinction our planet has ever known.

Collecting in this country also comes with responsibility. Many of these fossil localities lie within sensitive alpine environments or protected areas where collecting requires permits or is prohibited altogether. We tread lightly, respect the land, follow regulations, and remember that we are visitors in landscapes that have preserved these stories for hundreds of millions of years.

That is perhaps what I love most. You stand surrounded by towering peaks, yet beneath your boots lies the floor of an ancient tropical ocean. The mountains themselves are built from forgotten seas, and every fossil reminds us that Earth is never still. 

Continents wander. Oceans open and close. Mountains rise. Species flourish, disappear, and give way to those yet to come.