BERLIN-ICHTHYSAUR STATE PARK, NEVADA

Time Slows at Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park

High on the hillside up a long entry road sits the entrance to Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park in central Nevada.

A worn American flag and sun bleached outbuildings greet you on your way to the outcrops. Away from the hustle and bustle that define the rest of Nevada this place feels remarkably serene. Your eyes squint against the sun as you search for ammonoids and other marine fossil fauna while your nose tends to the assault from the bracing smell of sage brush.

This site holds many stories. The interpretive centre displays wonderful marine reptiles, ichthyosaurs in situ, as you might expect from the name of the park — but it also showcases years of history lovingly tended. This stretch of dry golden low hills dappled with the yellow of creosote and desert grasses is an important locality for our understanding of the Carnian-Norian boundary (CNB) in North America.

The area is known worldwide as one of the most important ichthyosaur Fossil-Lagerstätte because of the sheer volume of remarkably well-preserved, fully articulated (all the sweet bones laid out all in a row...) specimens of Shonisaurus popularis.

Rich ammonoid faunas outcrop in the barren hills of the Upper Triassic (Early Norian, Kerri zone), Luning Formation, West Union Canyon, Nevada. They were studied by N. J. Silberling (1959) and provide support for the definition of the Schucherti and Macrolobatus zones of the latest Carnian — which are here overlain by well-preserved faunas of the earliest Norian Kerri Zone. 

The genus Gonionotites, very common in the Tethys and British Columbia, is for the moment, unknown in Nevada. The Upper Carnian faunas are dominated by Tropitidae, while Juvavitidae are conspicuously lacking. 

Middle Triassic Ammonoids

Despite its importance, no further investigations had been done at this site for a good 50 years. That changed in 2010 when Jim Haggart, Mike Orchard and Paul Smith — all local Vancouverites — collaborated on a project that took them down to Nevada to look at the conodonts and ammonoids. They did a bed-by-bed sampling of ammonoids and conodonts in West Union Canyon during October of that year.

October is an ideal time to do fieldwork in this area. There are a few good weeks between screaming hot and frigid cold. It is also tarantula breeding season so keep your eyes peeled. Those sweet little burrows you see are not from rodents but rather largish arachnids. 

The eastern side of the canyon provides the best record of the Macrolobatus Zone, which is represented by several beds yielding ammonoids of the Tropites group, together with Anatropites div. sp. 

Conodont faunas from both these and higher beds are dominated by ornate metapolygnthids that would formerly have been collectively referred to Metapolygnathus primitius, a species long known to straddle the CNB. Within this lower part of the section, they resemble forms that have been separated as Metapolygnathus mersinensis. Slightly higher, forms close to Epigondolella' orchardi and a single Orchardella n. sp. occur. This association can be correlated with the latest Carnian in British Columbia.

Higher in the section, the ammonoid fauna shows a sudden change and is dominated by Tropithisbites. Few tens of metres above, but slightly below the first occurrence of Norian ammonoids Guembelites jandianus and Stikinoceras, two new species of conodonts (Gen et sp. nov. A and B) appear that also occur close to the favoured Carnian/Norian boundary at Black Bear Ridge, British Columbia. Stratigraphically higher collections continue to be dominated by forms close to M. mersinensis and E. orchardi after BC's own Mike Orchard.

The best exposure of the Kerri Zone is on the western side of the West Union Canyon. Ammonoids, dominated by Guembelites and Stikinoceras div. sp., have been collected from several fossil-bearing levels. Conodont faunas replicate those of the east section. The collected ammonoids fit perfectly well with the faunas described by Silberling in 1959, but they differ somewhat from coeval faunas of the Tethys and Canada. 

The ammonoid fauna paints a compelling picture of Tethyan influence with a series of smoking guns. We see an abundance of Tropitidae in the Carnian, a lack of Pterosirenites in the Norian, copious Guembelites, the Tethyan species G. philostrati, the stratigraphic position of G. clavatus and the rare occurrence of Gonionotites. Their hallelujah moment was likely finding an undescribed species of the thin-shelled bivalve Halobia similar to Halobia beyrichi — the clincher that perhaps seals this deal on Tethyan influence. 

I'll take a boo to see what Christopher McRoberts published on the find. A jolly good idea to have him on this expedition as it would have been easy to overlook if the focus remained solely on the conodonts and ammonoids. McRoberts has published on the much-studied Pardonet Formation up in the Willison Lake Area of Northeastern, British Columbia. He knows a thing or two about Upper Triassic Bivalvia and the correlation to coeval faunas elsewhere in the North American Cordillera, and to the Boreal, Panthalassan and Tethyan faunal realms. 

If you fancy a read, they published a paper: "Towards the definition of the Carnian/Norian Boundary: New data on Ammonoids and Conodonts from central Nevada," which you can find in the proceedings of the 21st Canadian Paleontology Conference; by Haggart, J W (ed.); Smith, P L (ed.); Canadian Paleontology Conference Proceedings no. 9, 2011 p. 9-10.

Fig. 1. Location map of Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park

Marco Balini, James Jenks, Riccardo Martin, Christopher McRoberts, along with Mike Orchard and Norman Siberling, did a bed by bed sampling in 2013 and published on The Carnian/Norian boundary succession at Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park (Upper Triassic, central Nevada, USA) and published in January 2014 in Paläontologische Zeitschrift 89:399–433. That work is available for download from ResearchGate. The original is in German, but there is a translation available.

After years of reading about the correlation between British Columbia and Nevada, I had the very great pleasure of walking through these same sections in October 2019 with members of the Vancouver Paleontological Society and Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society. It was with that same crew that I'd originally explored fossil sites in the Canadian Rockies in the early 2000s. Those early trips led to paper after paper and the exciting revelations that inspired our Nevada adventure.

If you plan your own adventure, you'll want to keep an eye out for some of the other modern fauna — mountain lions, snakes, lizards, scorpions, wolves, coyotes, foxes, ground squirrels, rabbits, falcons, hawks, eagles, bobcats, sheep, deer and pronghorns.

Figure One: Location map of Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park. A detailed road log with access information for this locality is provided in Lucas et al. (2007).

KING OF THE TRILOBITES: UNEARTHING ISOTELUS REX

Isotelus rex, the King of Trilobites

In the remote limestone flats of northern Manitoba, a remarkable fossil lay undisturbed for nearly half a billion years. Sunken in gray stone, its broad armored body preserved in exquisite detail, it waited silently—until a team of Canadian paleontologists happened upon it during a summer field expedition in 1999.

What they uncovered would change the story of trilobites forever.

Meet Isotelus rex, the largest complete trilobite ever discovered—a 70-centimetre-long prehistoric titan from the Ordovician seas. It's more than just a big trilobite. It’s a window into an ancient world and a landmark find in Canadian paleontology.

A Fossil Giant in a Forgotten Sea

Trilobites, extinct marine arthropods, are among the most iconic fossils in the world. Their hard, segmented exoskeletons and alien-like eyes make them favorites among collectors and scientists alike. They first appeared more than 520 million years ago and thrived in Earth’s oceans for over 270 million years before vanishing in the Permian extinction.

Many trilobites are palm-sized or smaller. But Isotelus rex was something else entirely.

Discovered near William Lake in the Hudson Bay Lowlands of Manitoba, Isotelus rex was preserved in limestone laid down when central Canada was submerged beneath a warm, shallow sea. That sea teemed with life—brachiopods, nautiloids, sea lilies, and trilobites like Isotelus, which would have cruised the muddy bottom looking for food.

With its broad, paddle-shaped tail, deeply segmented body, and large compound eyes, Isotelus rex was a slow-moving but imposing presence on the seafloor.

The Paleontologists Behind the Discovery

The discovery was made by a team of seasoned Canadian researchers: Dr. David Rudkin of the Royal Ontario Museum, Dr. Graham Young and Edward Dobrzanske of the Manitoba Museum, and Dr. Robert Elias from the University of Manitoba. 

All were participating in a joint field expedition to study the fossil-rich limestone of the Churchill River Group, near Churchill in northern Manitoba.

Dr. Rudkin is one of Canada’s leading experts on Paleozoic arthropods, with a particular passion for trilobites and other ancient sea creatures. 

His work at the Royal Ontario Museum has helped bring the stories of long-extinct animals to life through detailed study and public exhibition.

Dr. Young, curator of geology and paleontology at the Manitoba Museum, specializes in ancient marine ecosystems—piecing together how life functioned and interacted in prehistoric oceans. 

Dr. Elias, a geologist and paleontologist at the University of Manitoba, focuses on Paleozoic reefs and ancient sedimentary environments. Dobrzanske, a collections technician and field expert, brought deep practical knowledge to the fieldwork.

It was the perfect blend of expertise and passion.

One overcast morning, while surveying outcrops of Ordovician limestone, the team spotted a familiar ripple in the rock—a faint curve suggesting a trilobite’s cephalon, or head shield. As they slowly and carefully uncovered more of the fossil, its remarkable size and completeness became apparent.

The mostly complete holotype specimen of Isotelus rex, from the Churchill River Group, measures a staggering 720 millimetres (28 inches) in length, 400 millimetres (16 inches) in maximum width across the cephalon, and 70 millimetres (3 inches) in height at the posterior midpoint of the head. It remains the largest complete trilobite ever found.

“We thought it might be a fluke,” Rudkin later recalled. “A fragment from a large individual. But as we kept going—it just kept going. That was when we realized we were looking at something truly extraordinary.”

Perfect Conditions for Preservation

Unlike many trilobite fossils, which are found in fragments or disarticulated pieces, Isotelus rex was remarkably well-preserved—fully articulated, lying in life position.

Paleontologists believe it was buried rapidly by fine carbonate mud, likely during a sudden underwater event like a storm or sediment slump. The seafloor at the time was likely anoxic—lacking oxygen—which would have prevented decay and scavenging, allowing the trilobite’s body to remain intact as minerals slowly fossilized it over millions of years.

“It’s one of the most complete large trilobites ever found anywhere in the world,” said Young. “It offers a rare look at what these creatures really looked like, in full form.”

While its size is headline-grabbing, Isotelus rex offers deeper scientific insights. It shows that trilobites—already known for their diversity—could grow far larger than previously thought. Its presence in northern Manitoba also highlights how much of Canada’s paleontological richness remains underexplored.

The fossil was later transported to Winnipeg, where it became a highlight of the Manitoba Museum’s paleontology collection. A custom case was built to display it—regular trilobite mounts just wouldn’t do for a specimen of this scale.

The name Isotelus rex—Latin for “equal end king”—reflects both its classification and its grandeur.

Today, Isotelus rex is more than just a museum centerpiece. It’s a reminder of the power of curiosity, collaboration, and exploration. It represents a frozen moment from 450 million years ago, when trilobites were the dominant animals of Earth’s seas.

And thanks to the eyes, hands, and minds of Rudkin, Elias, Young, and Dobrzanske, we now know what the king of trilobites looked like and he is an impressive specimen, indeed!

Image credit: Isotelus rex TMP 2009.003.0003 (cast). 445 million years old, late Ordovician, Churchill River Group, Churchill, Manitoba. At the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology. Bloopityboop

BURGESS SHALE FOSSILS: A DEEP TIME JOURNEY IN YOHO NATIONAL PARK

Tucked high in the Canadian Rockies above the tiny hamlet of Field, British Columbia, lies one of the most extraordinary fossil sites on Earth — the Burgess Shale. 

This UNESCO World Heritage site offers a rare and detailed look at life on Earth over half a billion years ago, during a time known as the Cambrian Explosion.

Whether you're a seasoned paleontology buff or a curious traveler, this ancient treasure trove belongs on your bucket list. Here’s everything you need to know about the fossils, the tours, how to get there, where to stay, eat, and explore.

Why Are the Burgess Shale Fossils Important?

The fossils of the Burgess Shale are a paleontological jackpot. Dating back 508 million years, they preserve not just the hard shells and bones, but also the soft tissues of ancient creatures — things like gills, eyes, and guts. These rare details offer a vivid snapshot of life in the ancient Cambrian seas.

Discovered by Charles Doolittle Walcott in 1909, the Burgess Shale holds some of the earliest and weirdest animals to ever live on Earth — including:

• Anomalocaris – a top predator with grasping arms and a ring of teeth
• Opabinia – a creature with five eyes and a long, tube-like nose
• Hallucigenia – a spiny worm that once puzzled scientists with its upside-down anatomy
• Pikaia – one of the first known animals with a notochord, an early precursor to the backbone

These fossils help us understand the roots of animal evolution — including our own.

Guided Fossil Tours: Hike Through Deep Time

Yes — you can actually visit these ancient fossil beds! Parks Canada offers guided day hikes to several Burgess Shale sites during the summer months (late June to early September). All tours must be booked in advance and are mandatory to access these protected areas. You can take photos galore but cannot collect or keep any of the fossils. They are protected and their removal is illegal.

Book Your Guided Burgess Shale Hike

Here are the main hikes you can choose from:

1. Walcott Quarry Hike

• Difficulty: Challenging (22 km round trip, ~11 hrs)
• Highlights: Iconic fossil site, stunning mountain scenery, classic fossils
• Departs from: Takakkaw Falls parking lot, Yoho National Park

2. Mount Stephen Trilobite Beds

• Difficulty: Moderate (8 km round trip, ~6 hrs)
• Highlights: Ground covered in trilobites, panoramic views
• Departs from: Field Visitor Centre

3. Stanley Glacier Hike (Kootenay National Park)

• Difficulty: Moderate (10 km round trip, ~7 hrs)
• Highlights: Newer fossil site, unique specimens, stunning glaciers
• Departs from: Stanley Glacier Trailhead

Note: You’ll need good hiking shoes, layers for changing weather, plenty of water, and a spirit of adventure.

Where to Stay Near the Burgess Shale

Field, BC is the perfect home base for your fossil adventure. It’s quaint, quiet, and surrounded by jaw-dropping mountain beauty.

Top Places to Stay:

• Cathedral Mountain Lodge – Rustic luxury cabins, great food, stunning setting.
• Emerald Lake Lodge – A short drive away, this lakeside lodge is a slice of paradise.
• Guesthouses & B&Bs in Field – Charming, cozy options like The Great Divide Lodge and Fireweed Hostel.

Where to Eat in and Around Field

While Field is small, it packs a punch with local, hearty eats:

• Truffle Pigs Bistro – Field’s culinary gem. Comfort food with a gourmet twist.
• The Siding Café – Great for coffee, sandwiches, and baked goods. Cozy and casual.
• Cathedral Mountain Lodge Dining Room – Upscale Rocky Mountain dining if you’re staying at the lodge.

Tip: There’s no gas station in Field. Fill up in Lake Louise (30 minutes away).

How to Get to Field, British Columbia

Field is nestled in Yoho National Park, just off the Trans-Canada Highway. Here's how long it'll take you from major cities:

Driving Times to Field, BC

• From Vancouver: ~8.5 hours (850 km via Hwy 1 through Kamloops and Golden)
• From Calgary: ~2.5 hours (215 km via Hwy 1 through Banff and Lake Louise)

You’ll pass through some of the most scenic mountain corridors in North America. Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for wildlife — mountain goats, bears, and elk often make an appearance.

A Lasting Legacy in Stone

Standing among the Burgess Shale beds, surrounded by towering peaks and the whispers of deep time, it’s hard not to feel humbled. These fossils tell the story of life’s earliest steps into complexity — a reminder of how strange, beautiful, and interconnected our world truly is.

Whether you're chasing trilobites or just soaking in the grandeur of Yoho’s landscapes, the Burgess Shale offers something extraordinary: a chance to walk with the ghosts of Earth’s earliest animals.

Learn More: (pop these in Google for more information)

• Parks Canada – Burgess Shale Official Site
• Royal Ontario Museum – Burgess Shale Project
• UNESCO World Heritage Info

I highly recommend all of these hikes. If you have the time and fitness, they are amazing and each of them offers some epic views!

MASSIVE FOSSIL AMMONITE NEAR FERNIE, BRITISH COLUMBIA

Titanites occidentalis, Fernie Ammonite

The Fernie ammonite, Titanites occidentalis, from outcrops on Coal Mountain near Fernie, British Columbia, Canada. 

This beauty is the remains of a carnivorous cephalopod within the family Dorsoplanitidae that lived and died in a shallow sea some 150 million years ago.

If you would like to get off the beaten track and hike up to see this ancient beauty, you will want to head to the town of Fernie in British Columbia close to the Alberta border. 

This is the traditional territory of the the Yaq̓it ʔa·knuqⱡi ‘it First Nation who have lived here since time immemorial. There was some active logging along the hillside in 2021, so if you are looking at older directions on how to get to the site be mindful that many of the trailheads have been altered and a fair bit of bushwhacking will be necessary to get to the fossil site proper. That being said, the loggers from CanWel may have clear-cut large sections of the hillside but they did give the ammonite a wide berth and have left it intact.

Wildsight, a non-profit environmental group out of the Kimberly Cranbrook area has been trying to gain grant funding to open up the site as an educational hike with educational signage for folks visiting the Fernie area. It is likely the province of British Columbia would top up those funds if they are able to place the ammonite under the Heritage Conservation Act. CanWel would remain the owners of the land but the province could assume the liability for those visiting this iconic piece of British Columbia's palaeontological history. 

Driving to the trail base is along an easy access road just east of town along Fernie Coal Road. There are some nice exposures of Cretaceous plant material on the north side (left-hand side) of the road as you head from Fernie towards Coal Creek. I recently drove up to Fernie to look at Cretaceous plant material and locate the access point to the now infamous Late Jurassic (Tithonian) Titanites (S.S. Buckman, 1921) site. While the drive out of town is on an easy, well-maintained road, the slog up to the ammonite site is often a wet, steep push.

Fernie, British Columbia, Canada

The first Titanites occidentalis was about one-third the size and was incorrectly identified as Lytoceras, a fast-moving nektonic carnivore. The specimen you see here is significantly larger at 1.4 metres (about four and a half feet) and rare in North America. 

Titanites occidentalis, the Western Giant, is the second known specimen of this extinct fossil species. 

The first was discovered in 1947 in nearby Coal Creek by a British Columbia Geophysical Society mapping team. When they first discovered this marine fossil high up on the hillside, they could not believe their eyes — both because it is clearly marine at the top of a mountain and the sheer size of this ancient beauty.

In the summer of 1947, a field crew was mapping coal outcrops for the BC Geological Survey east of Fernie. One of the students reported finding “a fossil truck tire.” Fair enough. The similarity of size and optics are pretty close to your average Goodridge. 

A few years later, GSC Paleontologist Hans Frebold described and named the fossil Titanites occidentalis after the large Jurassic ammonites from Dorset, England. The name comes from Greek mythology. Tithonus, as you may recall, was the Prince of Troy. He fell in love with Eos, the Greek Goddess of the Dawn. Eos begged Zeus to make her mortal lover immortal. Zeus granted her wish but did not grant Tithonus eternal youth. He did indeed live forever — ageing hideously. Ah, Zeus, you old trickster. It is a clever play on time placement. Dawn is the beginning of the day and the Tithonian being the latest age of the Late Jurassic. Clever Hans!

HIKING TO THE FERNIE AMMONITE

From the town of Fernie, British Columbia, head east along Coal Creek Road towards Coal Creek. The site is 3.81 km from the base of Coal Creek Road to the trailhead as the crow flies. I have mapped it here for you in yellow and added the wee purple GPS marker for the ammonite site proper. There is a nice, dark grey to black roadcut exposure of Cretaceous plants on the north side of the dirt road that is your cue to pull over and park.  

You access what is left of the trailhead on the south side of the road. You will need to cross the creek to begin your ascent. There is no easy way across the creek and you'll want to tackle this one with a friend when the water level is low. 

The beginning of the trail is not clear but a bit of searching will reveal the trailhead with its telltale signs of previous hikers. This is a moderate 6.3-kilometre hike up & back bushwhacking through scrub and fallen trees. Heading up, you will make about a 246-metre elevation gain. You will likely not have a cellular signal up here but if you download the Google Map to your mobile, you will have GPS to guide you. The area has been recently logged so much of the original trail has been destroyed. There may now be easier vehicle access up the logging roads but I have not driven them since the logging and new road construction.

If you are coming in from out of town, the closest airport is Cranbrook. Then it is about an hour and change to Fernie and another 15-minutes or so to park near the site.

You will want to leave your hammers with your vehicle (no need to carry the weight and this lovely should never be struck with anything more than a raindrop) as this site is best enjoyed with a camera. 

This is a site you will want to wear hiking boots to access. Know that these will get wet as you cross the creek. 

If you would like to see the ammonite but are not keen on the hike, a cast has been made by fossil preparator Rod Bartlett is on display at the Courtenay Museum in Courtenay, Vancouver Island, Canada. 

Respect for the Land / Leave No Trace

As your feet move up the hillside, you can imagine this land 10,000 years ago, rising above great glaciers. Where footfalls trace the steps of those that came before you. This land has been home to the Yaq̓it ʔa·knuqⱡi ‘it First Nation and Ktunaxa or Kukin ʔamakis First Nations whose oral history have them living here since time immemorial. Like them, take only what you need and no more than the land offers — packing out anything that you packed in. 

Fernie Ammonite Palaeo Coordinates: 49°29'04"N 115°00'49"W

ANCIENT SEA MONSTERS: ICHTHYOSAURS AND MOSASAURS

When we think of prehistoric creatures, dinosaurs usually steal the spotlight. But beneath the ancient waves swam giants just as awe-inspiring—and sometimes even more terrifying. 

Among these marine reptiles, two groups stand out: ichthyosaurs and mosasaurs. Though they never coexisted, both ruled the oceans in their own time and in their own terrifying ways.

Ichthyosaurs: Dolphin-Like Reptiles of the Jurassic

Ichthyosaurs (meaning "fish lizards") were sleek, fast swimmers that first appeared around 250 million years ago during the Triassic. 

Their streamlined bodies, long snouts, and large eyes gave them an appearance eerily similar to modern dolphins—though they weren’t mammals. This resemblance is a perfect example of convergent evolution, where unrelated animals develop similar traits to adapt to similar environments.

Some ichthyosaurs grew as long as a school bus, and their enormous eyes (some as large as dinner plates) suggest they were capable of deep-sea hunting. They fed on fish, squid, and other marine life, and some species likely gave birth to live young—a rare trait among reptiles.

They thrived for millions of years but began to decline in the mid-Cretaceous, eventually going extinct before the rise of mosasaurs.

Mosasaurs: Apex Predators of the Cretaceous Seas

Enter the mosasaurs, who rose to dominance after the ichthyosaurs were gone. Mosasaurs appeared around 98 million years ago and ruled the oceans until the mass extinction event 66 million years ago that also wiped out the dinosaurs.

These were true marine lizards, closely related to today’s monitor lizards and snakes. Picture a massive, crocodile-headed Komodo dragon with flippers and a shark-like tail—and you’ll have a good image of a mosasaur. Some species grew over 50 feet long, and their jaws were packed with conical, backward-curving teeth perfect for gripping slippery prey.

Mosasaurs were apex predators, eating anything they could catch—fish, turtles, birds, and even other mosasaurs. Their double-jointed jaws could open wide, allowing them to swallow large prey whole.

Who Would Win in a Fight?

While it’s fun to imagine a battle between an ichthyosaur and a mosasaur, it never could have happened—ichthyosaurs were long extinct by the time mosasaurs evolved. That said, mosasaurs were more heavily built and had powerful jaws, making them formidable hunters. Ichthyosaurs were faster and more agile, more suited to quick chases than brute force.

Legacy Beneath the Waves

Both ichthyosaurs and mosasaurs left behind rich fossil records, giving scientists insight into how reptiles adapted to life in the oceans. Their bones have been found on every continent, including Antarctica, reminding us that the ancient oceans were just as dynamic and dangerous as today’s wildest habitats.

Next time you watch a documentary about dinosaurs or visit a natural history museum, take a moment to appreciate the marine reptiles that once ruled the seas. After all, the land wasn't the only place where prehistoric giants thrived.

UNEARTHING A JUVENILE ELASMOSAUR ON THE TRENT RIVER

Pat Trask with a Fossil Rib Bone. Photo: Rebecca Miller

In August of 2020, an incredible elasmosaur fossil—a mighty marine reptile—was unearthed high up on the cliffs of the Trent River near Courtenay, on the east coast of Vancouver Island, British Columbia. 

This thrilling find marks the culmination of a three-year palaeontological puzzle that began with mere fragments and ended with a daring cliffside excavation!

Elasmosaurs were long-necked marine reptiles roaming Earth's oceans from the Late Triassic to the Late Cretaceous (roughly 215 to 80 million years ago). 

Our Trent River specimen clocks in at about 85 million years old. The rock layers in this area were originally laid down as tropical islands far to the south of the equator. Over tens of millions of years, plate tectonics slowly carried these ancient seabeds north and slightly east to the site we know today on Vancouver Island.

For years, tantalizing fragments of this juvenile elasmosaur washed out of the riverbanks—bones that fired the imagination of fossil enthusiasts but stubbornly refused to reveal their precise origin. The first clue surfaced back in 2017 during a Courtenay Museum fossil tour led by Pat Trask. 

One lucky participant picked up a small finger bone from the river. Pat recognized it immediately as belonging to a marine reptile, possibly an elasmosaur. Although it was an exciting discovery, its source on the cliffs remained a frustrating mystery.

Fast forward to 2018. Another fossil tour, another chance encounter: a wrist bone—again, possibly elasmosaur—turning up in the Trent River. Pat looked down in that very moment and spotted a vertebra right at his feet! Now with multiple bones in hand, Pat collected them in the museum’s lab, increasingly determined to find their point of origin.

Throughout 2019, Pat and volunteers from the Vancouver Island Palaeontological Society (VIPS) combed the area for clues. They rappelled down cliff faces, deployed a drone to scour every crack and crevice, but found nothing definitive. 

Then, in August 2020, everything changed. While leading another fossil tour, Pat stumbled across a newly revealed bone in the river—one that absolutely had not been there the day before. Looking up, he spotted a promising section of cliff and, with help from his wife, Deb, and a trusty telescope, he finally spied a bone jutting from the rock.

The excavation that followed was a marvel of planning and perseverance. Scaffolding had to be built, climbing gear prepared, and countless safety measures put into place. 

Over several weeks, the team carefully pried fossil after fossil from the cliff—loose rib bones, gastroliths (stones swallowed for digestion), wrist bones, finger bones, and parts of the back and pelvis. 

The bigger prize, wrapped safely in plaster and lowered ever-so-gently to the riverbank below, contained an array of bones that could include the skull.

Pat Trask Wrapping the plaster casing

This discovery is part of the Trent River’s ongoing reputation for yielding stunning fossils. 

The Courtenay Museum regularly hosts tours here, offering members of the public a chance to walk the same banks and maybe—just maybe—spot the next big find. 

Past discoveries include other marine reptiles and invertebrate fossils, painting a picture of Vancouver Island’s prehistoric marine ecosystems.

For Pat Trask and his family, the discovery is deeply personal. Pat’s brother, Mike Trask, famously found another elasmosaur on the nearby Puntledge River back in 1988. 

There’s even talk that if this particular find proves to be a new species, it could bear the Trask family name in the scientific literature—a fitting tribute to their passion, grit, and history-making finds in the Comox Valley.

 So far, the bones point clearly to an elasmosaur. At roughly four meters in length, this juvenile is smaller than its adult kin, but it’s no less impressive. Every retrieved vertebra, humerus, and pelvis bone draws us deeper into the ancient ocean world of 85 million years ago. James Wood of the VIPS has taken on the painstaking task of preparing the specimen, aided by a new air abrasive generously provided by the Courtenay Museum.

With the fossil safely in the museum’s care, and research well underway, the Trent River elasmosaur story is poised to shine a spotlight on Vancouver Island’s extraordinary prehistoric past. From the moment that first finger bone surfaced in 2017 to the triumphant lowering of the plaster-wrapped jacket in 2020, this has been an adventure for the ages—and a spectacular reminder that our island still has secrets waiting to be discovered!

I hope to see it published with the Trask family name. Their paleontological history is forever tied to the Comox Valley and the honour would be fitting.  

Photo One: Rebecca Miller, Little Prints Photography — she is awesome!

Photo Two: James Wood prepped the material and Pat Trask labelled and oriented the bones.

Photo Three: Pat Trask perched atop scaffolding along the Trent River. And yes, he's attached to a safety line to secure him in case of fall. 

Photo Four: A diagram of the juvenile elasmosaur. See the Excavation Moment via Video Link: https://youtu.be/r82EcEF7Pfc

SECRETS IN STONE: VANCOUVER ISLAND'S TRENT RIVER

Trent River, Vancouver Island, BC

Deep in the moss-draped forests of Vancouver Island, beneath a green canopy of second-growth firs and the distant chatter of ravens, an ancient story lies written in stone. 

You’ll find it not in dusty museums but in the riverbeds, sandstone ledges, and shale cliffs of the Trent River, just south of Courtenay, British Columbia. 

This is a place where geology meets adventure — and where fossil hunters walk through time.

This area has been collected and studied in large part due to the efforts of the Vancouver Island Paleontological Society (VIPS) and its members. 

These keen and knowledgeable citizen scientists have had a huge impact on our understanding of fossils in the region. 

The picture below taken on August 20, 2020, when we were all down on the Trent for the extraction of Baby E-a marine reptile found high up in the bank by Pat Trask. 

The Courtenay Museum hosts regular fossil tours here, led by Pat Trask. On one of those field trips back in 2017, Pat was leading a trip with a family and one of the field trip participants picked up a marine reptile finger bone. 

It was laying in the river having eroded out from a nearby cliff. She showed it to Pat and he immediately recognized it as being diagnostic — it definitely belonged to a marine reptile — possibly an elasmosaur — but what species and just where on the river it had eroded from were still a mystery. As more and more of these bits and pieces were discovered, a very tasty pattern was emerging. Somewhere here, embedded in stone and eroding out bit by bit was a mighty marine reptile. 

The excavation was the culmination of a three-year paleontological puzzle of various folk finding bits and pieces of the specimen but ever elusive, had been unable to locate the source. Time and perseverance won the day and that August morning we were on hand to bring that baby, aptly named Baby-E, out of the site and off to be prepped.

In the photo are VIPS members, James Wood, Betty Franklin, Dan Bowen and Jay Hawley. Each of their personal contributions to the paleontology of the Comox Valley, Vancouver Island and the Pacific Northwest are immense.

A Journey Across Oceans and Ages

The rocks that make up the Trent River landscape weren’t born here. In fact, they began their journey over 85 million years ago, far south of the equator as part of a scattered chain of tropical islands. 

These fragments, riding the massive Pacific Plate, drifted slowly across the ocean, eventually slamming into the western edge of the North American continent.

The Pacific Plate — the largest tectonic plate on Earth, covering over 103 million square kilometers — is a restless force. Fueled by volcanic activity at its spreading center, it continues to expand, pushing against the North American Plate and forcing the ocean floor beneath the continent in a process known as subduction. Over time, this relentless collision helped build the rugged mountains and rich geological complexity of British Columbia.

Among the remnants of those far-flung islands is the Insular Superterrane — a mash-up of crustal fragments welded onto the continent from the Late Cretaceous through the Eocene. This allochthonous (meaning "foreign") terrain is geologically distinct from the rest of the mainland. The rocks you walk on along the Trent River don’t match anything next door in Alberta or even down the road. They’re relics of a world long lost to time.

Fossils Beneath Your Feet

In the 1970s, pioneering geologists Jim Monger and Charlie Ross of the Geological Survey of Canada helped map the complex tectonic puzzle of the Comox Basin. Their work revealed that by 85 million years ago, the Insular Superterrane — and the rocks of the Trent River — had already collided with the mainland, forming part of what we now know as Vancouver Island.

Back then, this region was a lush, subtropical landscape. Fossilized leaves and wood found in the area show ancient relatives of oak, poplar, maple, ash — even figs and breadfruit — thrived here. These are the botanical echoes of the Late Cretaceous, preserved in the mudstones and sandstones along the riverbank.

As you follow the river upstream, you'll come to a striking boundary: the transition from the dark-grey marine shales of the Haslam Formation to the sandy, more terrestrial Comox Formation. This contact zone marks a shift from deep ocean to coastal plain, and both formations offer their own fossil treasures.

Ammonites, Turtles, and Dinosaurs — Oh My!

Head west from Trent River Falls and you’ll arrive at Ammonite Alley, where the shale of the Haslam Formation has yielded beautiful examples of Mesopuzosia and Kitchinites, coiled marine cephalopods that once swam in warm Cretaceous seas. This section represents the Polytychoceras vancouverense ammonite zone, a biostratigraphic marker dating back roughly 84 to 83 million years.

Further along, past slick algae-covered stones and twisting alder roots, the story shifts from ocean to land. Paleontologists have uncovered both marine and terrestrial fossil turtles here — including the rare helochelydrid Naomichelys speciosa, a stubby-limbed, tank-like land turtle that once lumbered through the Cretaceous underbrush.

Even more impressive is the discovery of hadrosauroid dinosaur vertebrae by awesome possum Mike Trask — the tailbone of a duck-billed herbivore that may have wandered the nearby floodplains. Nearby, in the fine-grained sediments of Idle Creek, fossilized leaves and logs still peek from the rock, offering tantalizing clues about the forest these creatures once called home.

And then there’s the ratfish — one of the most bizarre and enigmatic finds from the Trent. Fossils of Hydrolagus colliei, a modern-day chimaera species still living off the Pacific coast, have been found in the area. This particular specimen was a bruiser, larger than its modern kin and armed with disproportionately large eyes and unusual reproductive anatomy. As unappetizing to ancient predators as it is to us, this creature is a fascinating link between ancient and modern marine ecosystems.

Where the Ancient Meets the Present

The Trent River is just one piece of a larger fossil-rich puzzle that includes nearby rivers like the Puntledge, also known for its fossil finds — including marine turtles such as Desmatochelys, as detailed in a 1992 paper by paleontologist Elizabeth Nicholls. 

The Puntledge is significant to the K'ómoks First Nation, who have lived in this region since Time Immemorial and know the river by many names from the Puntledge, Sahtloot, Sasitla, and Ieeksun.

Today, fossil hunters — amateur and professional alike — can follow the rivers through time, discovering clues to a vastly different world hidden in the layers beneath their boots.

Planning Your Adventure

If you're ready to explore the paleontological wonders of the Trent River, head about three kilometres south of Courtenay along Highway 19. Look for a safe pull-off just south of the Cumberland Interchange. A trail leads from the highway beneath the bridge, bringing you to the river’s north bank. From here, the journey unfolds — a mix of scrambling, creek-walking, and sharp-eyed searching that can reveal fossils untouched for millions of years.

To head out on a guided tour of the river, visit the Courtenay Museum website and book in with Pat Trask to take you there, share the river's paleontological history and how to find fossils.

Remember: fossil collection is regulated, so always check local rules and never remove fossils from protected sites. In British Columbia, fossils belong to the province. If you find a fossil, you become its steward, noting where you found it and keeping it safe. Sharing your fossil finds with local paleontological societies and museums helps us to know what has been found and let's you know if that find is significant. If it is a new species, it might even be named after you!

The Trent River reminds us that adventure doesn’t always mean scaling peaks or paddling rapids. Sometimes, it’s found in quiet moments along a riverside, where the moss is thick, the rocks are ancient, and time itself feels close enough to touch.

MIDDLE TRIASSIC HUMBOLT RANGE OF NEVADA

Looking out over the Middle Triassic exposures of the Humboldt Mountain Range.

I was down in Nevada to walk through the outcrops of the Humbolt Range with Dan Bowen and Betty Franklin of the Vancouver Island Paleontological Society and John Fam from the Vancouver Paleontological Society in October. 

We were kindly hosted by a wonderful fossil enthusiast who owns some prime property and agreed to drive up from California to meet us. 

These hills were the site of the 1905 Expedition of the University of California’s Department of Geology in Berkeley funded by the beautiful and bold, Annie Alexander, the women to whom the UCMP owes both its collection and existence. 

Annie brought together a paleontological crew to explore these localities and kept an expedition journal of their trip which is now on display at the University of California Museum of Paleontology at Berkeley.

Annie's interest was the ichthyosaurs and she was well pleased with the results. They dodged rattlesnakes and tarantulas, finding many new specimens as they opened up new quarries in the hills of the Humboldt Range of Nevada.

Ichthyosaurs range from quite small, just a foot or two, to well over twenty-six metres in length and resembled both modern fish and dolphins. The specimens from Nevada are especially large and well-preserved. They hail from a time, some 217 million years ago, when Nevada, and parts of the western USA, was covered by an ancient ocean that would one day become our Pacific Ocean. Many ichthyosaur specimens have come out of Nevada. So many, in fact, that they named it their State Fossil back in 1977.

Fossil fragments and complete specimens of these marine reptiles have been collected in the Blue Lias near Lyme Regis and the Black Ven Marls. More recently, specimens have been collected from the higher succession near Seatown. Paddy Howe, Lyme Regis Museum geologist, found a rather nice Ichthyosaurus breviceps skull a few years back. A landslip in 2008 unveiled some ribs poking out of the Church cliffs and a bit of digging revealed the ninth fossil skull ever found of a breviceps, with teeth and paddles to boot.

Specimens have since been found in Europe in Belgium, England, Germany, Switzerland and in Indonesia. Many tremendously well-preserved specimens come from the limestone quarries in Holzmaden, southern Germany.

BLUE LIAS ICHTHYOSAUR

This well-preserved partial ichthyosaur was found in the Blue Lias shales by Lewis Winchester-Ellis. The vertebrae you see here are from the tail section of this marine reptile.

The find includes stomach contents which tell us a little about how this particular fellow liked to dine.

As with most of his brethren, he enjoyed fish and cephalopods. Lewis found fishbone and squid tentacle hooklets in his belly. 

Oh yes, these ancient cephies had grasping hooklets on their tentacles. I'm picturing them wiggling all ominously. The hooklets were the only hard parts of the animal preserved in this case as the softer parts of this ancient calamari were fully or partially digested before this ichthyosaur met his end.

Ichthyosaurus was an extinct marine reptile first described from fossil fragments found in 1699 in Wales. Shortly thereafter, fossil vertebrae were published in 1708 from the Lower Jurassic and the first member of the order Ichthyosauria to be discovered.

To give that a bit of historical significance, this was the age of James Stuart, Jacobite hopeful to the British throne. While scientific journals of the day were publishing the first vertebrae ichthyosaur finds, he was avoiding the French fleet in the Firth of Forth off Scotland. This wasn’t Bonnie Prince Charlie, this was his Dad. Yes, that far back.

The first complete skeleton was discovered in the early 19th century by Mary Anning and her brother Joseph along the Dorset Jurassic Coast. Joseph had mistakenly, but quite reasonably, taken the find for an ancient crocodile. Mary excavated the specimen a year later and it was this and others that she found that would supply the research base others would soon publish on.

Mary's find was described by a British surgeon, Sir Everard Home, an elected Fellow of the Royal Society, in 1814. The specimen is now on display at the Natural History Museum in London bearing the name Temnodontosaurus platyodon, or “cutting-tooth lizard.”

Ichthyosaurus communis

In 1821, William Conybeare and Henry De La Beche, a friend of Mary's, published a paper describing three new species of unknown marine reptiles based on the Anning's finds.

Rev. William Buckland would go on to describe two small ichthyosaurs from the Lias of Lyme Regis, Ichthyosaurus communis and Ichthyosaurus intermedius, in 1837.

Remarkable, you'll recall that he was a theologian, geologist, palaeontologist AND Dean of Westminster. It was Buckland who published the first full account of a dinosaur in 1824, coining the name, "Megalosaurus."

The Age of Dinosaurs and Era of the Mighty Marine Reptile had begun.

Ichthyosaurs have been collected in the Blue Lias near Lyme Regis and the Black Ven Marls. More recently, specimens have been collected from the higher succession near Seatown. Paddy Howe, Lyme Regis Museum geologist, found a rather nice Ichthyosaurus breviceps skull a few years back. A landslip in 2008 unveiled some ribs poking out of the Church cliffs and a bit of digging revealed the ninth fossil skull ever found of a breviceps, with teeth and paddles to boot.

Specimens have since been found in Europe in Belgium, England, Germany, Switzerland and in Indonesia. Many tremendously well-preserved specimens come from the limestone quarries in Holzmaden, southern Germany.

Ichthyosaurs ranged from quite small, just a foot or two, to well over twenty-six metres in length and resembled both modern fish and dolphins.

Dean Lomax and Sven Sachs, both active (and delightful) vertebrate paleontologists, have described a colossal beast, Shonisaurus sikanniensis from the Upper Triassic (Norian) Pardonet Formation of northeastern British Columbia, Canada, measuring 3-3.5 meters in length. The specimen is now on display in the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Alberta, Canada. It was this discovery that tipped the balance in the vote, making it British Columbia's Official Fossil. Ichthyosaurs have been found at other sites in British Columbia, on Vancouver Island and the Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii) but Shoni tipped the ballot.

The first specimens of Shonisaurus were found in the 1990s by Peter Langham at Doniford Bay on the Somerset coast of England.

Dr. Betsy Nicholls, Rolex Laureate Vertebrate Palaeontologist from the Royal Tyrrell Museum, excavated the type specimen of Shonisaurus sikanniensis over three field sessions in one of the most ambitious fossil excavations ever ventured. Her efforts from 1999 through 2001, both in the field and lobbying back at home, paid off. Betsy published on this new species in 2004, the culmination of her life’s work and her last paper as we lost her to cancer in autumn of that year.

Roy Chapman Andrews, AMNH 1928 Expedition to the Gobi Desert

Charmingly, Betsy had a mail correspondence with Roy Chapman Andrews, former director of the American Museum of Natural History, going back to the late 1950s as she explored her potential career in palaeontology. Do you recall the AMNH’s sexy paleo photos of expeditions to the Gobi Desert in southern Mongolia in China in the early 20th century? I've posted a picture here to jog your memory. Roy Chapman Andrews was the lead on that trip. The man was dead sexy. His photos are what fueled the flames of my own interest in paleo.

We've found at least 37 specimens of Shonisaurus in Triassic outcrops of the Luning Formation in the Shoshone Mountains of Nevada, USA. The finds go back to the 1920s. The specimens that may it to publication were collected by M. Wheat and C. L. Camp in the 1950s.  The aptly named Shonisaurus popularis became the Nevada State Fossil in 1984. Our Shoni got around. Isolated remains have been found in a section of sandstone in Belluno, in the Eastern Dolomites, Veneto region of northeastern Italy. The specimens were published by Vecchia et al. in 2002.

For a time, Shonisaurus was the largest ichthyosaurus known.

Move over, Shoni, as a new marine reptile find competes with the Green Anaconda (Eunectes murinus) and the Blue Whale (Balaenoptera musculus) for size at a whopping twenty-six (26) metres.

The find is the prize of fossil collector turned co-author, Paul de la Salle, who (you guessed it) found it in the lower part of the intertidal area that outcrops strata from the latest Triassic Westbury Mudstone Formation of Lilstock on the Somerset coast. He contacted Dean Lomax and Judy Massare who became co-authors on the paper.

The find and conclusions from their paper put "dinosaur" bones from the historic Westbury Mudstone Formation of Aust Cliff, Gloucestershire, UK site into full reinterpretation.

And remember that ichthyosaur the good Reverend Buckland described back in 1837, the Ichthyosaurus communis? Dean Lomax was the first to describe a wee baby. A wee baby ichthyosaur! Awe. I know, right? He and paleontologist Nigel Larkin published this adorable first in the journal of Historical Biology in 2017.

They had teamed up previously on another first back in 2014 when they completed the reconstruction of an entire large marine reptile skull and mandible in 3-D, then graciously making it available to fellow researchers and the public. The skull and braincase in question were from an Early Jurassic, and relatively rare, Protoichthyosaurus prostaxalis. The specimen had been unearthed in Warwickshire back in the 1950s. Unlike most ichthyosaur finds of this age, it was not compressed and allowed the team to look at a 3-D specimen through the lens of computerized tomography (CT) scanning.

Another superb 3-D ichthyosaur skull was found near Lyme Regis by fossil hunter-turned-entrepreneur-local David Sole and prepped by the late David Costain. I'm rather hoping it went into a museum collection as it would be wonderful to see the specimen studied, imaged, scanned and 3-D printed for all to share. Here's hoping.

Ichthyosaurus somersetensis Credit: Dean R Lomax

Lomax and Sven Sachs also published on an embryo from one of the largest ichthyosaurs known, a new species named Ichthyosaurus somersetensis.

Their paper in the ACTA Palaeontologica Polonica from 2017, describes the third embryo known for Ichthyosaurus and the first to be positively identified to species level. The specimen was collected from Lower Jurassic strata (lower Hettangian, Blue Lias Formation) of Doniford Bay, Somerset, UK and is housed in the collection of the Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum (Lower Saxony State Museum) in Hannover, Germany.

We have learned a lot about them in the time we've been studying them. We now have thousands of specimens, some whole, some as bits and pieces. Many specimens that have been collected are only just now being studied and the tools we are using to study them are getting better and better.

Link to Lomax Paper: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article…

Link to Nathan's Paper: https://www.tandfonline.com/…/10.1080/03115518.2018.1523462…

Nicholls Paper: E. L. Nicholls and M. Manabe. 2004. Giant ichthyosaurs of the Triassic - a new species of Shonisaurus from the Pardonet Formation (Norian: Late Triassic) of British Columbia. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 24(4):838-849 [M. Carrano/H. Street]

BEARS: HARBINGERS OF SPRING

Stretching the legs on a Spring stroll

Some of Vancouver Island’s many bears take a stroll through the wilds in the Comox Valley. 

While stumbling upon them may cause us surprise, they have heard us (and smelled us) coming for miles. 

If you work or play in the woods of British Columbia, both grizzly and black bear sightings are common. 

As Spring arrives with warmer weather and growing daylight, bears begin awakening in the Comox Valley, across Vancouver Island and around the rest of the province, they wake up thirsty and often quench their thirst, then head back to their dens for more sleep. 

As well as parched, some have such powerful hunger they choose to forgo more sleep in favour of beginning the welcome task of searching for food. 

 

Up for a Spring snack but still a bit sleepy

They snack on plant roots, grasses, berries, insects, the shellfish on our coastlines and small mammals—all to replace the many calories they burned off over their winter hibernation. 

Nearly half the world's population, some 26,000 grizzly bears and 380,000 black bears, roam the Canadian wilderness — of those, 14,000 grizzlies and around 140,000-ish black bears call British Columbia home. 

These highly intelligent omnivores lumber along our coastlines, mountains and forests. It is hard to confirm how many live on Vancouver Island, but estimates range from 7,000 to 12,000. 

Bears in the Fossil Record Both bear families descend from a common ancestor, Ursavus, a bear-dog the size of a raccoon who lived more than 20 million years ago. Seems an implausible lineage given the size of their enormous descendants. 

Our Island black bears are a little larger than their mainland counterparts. Females can weigh up to almost 400 lbs or (180 kg), and our males get up to 600 lbs or (275 kg) in weight. 

Their beefy cousins get even bigger. An average grizzly weighs in around 800 lbs (363 kg), but a recent find in Alaska tops the charts at 1600 lbs (726 kg). This mighty beast stood 12' 6' high at the shoulder, 14' to the top of his head and is one of the largest grizzlies ever recorded — a na̱ndzi. Adult bears tend to live solo except during mating season. 

Those looking for love congregate from May to July hoping to find a mate. Through adaptation to shifting seasons, the females' reproductive system delays the implantation of fertilised eggs — blastocysts —until November or December to ensure her healthy pups arrive during hibernation. If food resources are slim, the newly formed embryo does not catch or attach to her uterine wall, and she would try again next year. 

Female grizzly bears reach mating maturity at 4-5 years of age. They give birth to a single or up to four cubs (though usually just two) in January or February. The newborn cubs are cute little nuggets — tiny, hairless, and helpless — weighing in at 2-3 kilograms or 4-8 pounds. 

They feast on their mother’s nutrient-dense milk for the first two months of life then stay with their mother for another 16 months or more. 

Once fully grown, they can run 56 km an hour, are good at climbing trees, swimming, and live 20-25 years in the wild. 

Bear encounters bring a humbling appreciation of how remarkable these massive beasts are. Knowing their level of intelligence, keen memory, and bite force of over 8,000,000 pascals — enough to crush a bowling ball — inspires awe and caution in equal measure. 

They have an indescribable presence. It is likely because of this that these majestic bears show up often in the superb carvings and work of First Nations artists. First Nation Lore and Language In the Kwak'wala language of the Kwakwaka'wakw — speakers of Kwak'wala — a grizzly bear is known as nan. 

The ornamental carved grizzly bear headdress worn by the comic Dluwalakha Grizzly Bear Dancers — Once more from Heaven — in the Grizzly Bear Dance or Gaga̱lalał, is known as na̱ng̱a̱mł. 

The Dluwalakha dancers receive supernatural treasures or dloogwi, which they pass down from generation to generation. 

Kwaguʼł Winter Dancers — Qagyuhl 

Should you encounter a black bear and wish to greet them in Kwak'wala, you would call them t̕ła'yi. Kwakiutl First Nations, Smoke of the World, count Grizzly Bears as an ancestor — along with Seagull, Sun and Thunderbird. To tell stories of the ancestors is na̱wiła. 

Smoke of the World / Speaking of the Ancestors — Na̱wiła

Each of these ancestors took off their masks to become human and founded the many groups now bound together by language and culture as Kwakwaka’wakw. Not all Kwakwaka'wakw dance the Gaga̱lalał, but their ancestors likely attended feasts where the great bear was celebrated. To speak or tell stories of the ancestors is na̱wiła — and Grizzly bear as an ancestor is Na̱n Helus. 

Whether ancestor or neighbour, these beautiful creatures live all around us. We may see them moving through our neighbourhoods for food or returning to their habitat. 

It is vital for all of us to be mindful of how our actions impact them and to keep attractants — delicious, smelly garbage and open food — in sealed garbage cans and not outside in open containers. We share this world with them and it is our responsibility to help keep them — and us — safe. 

Reporting Encounters: If you encounter wildlife that is aggressive or causing property damage, call the BC Conservation Officer Service at 1-877-952-7277 (RAPP). 

Bear Aware: BearWise offers great advice helping people live responsibly with bears. You can visit them online at https://bearwise.org/

MEMEKAY JURASSIC AMMONITES OF VANCOUVER ISLAND

Coroniceras sp. from Sayward, British Columbia

This yummy Lower Jurassic ammonite with the creamy dark chocolate colouring is from an all but inaccessible outcrop of the Upper Sinemurian, Bonanza Group,  Harbledownense Zone, Memekay River area, near Sayward, Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. 

This area is home to the We Wai Kai and Wei Wai Kum First Nations and lands of the K'omoks First Nation whose culture thrives and reflects the natural rugged beauty of the central island region.

I will be headed back to these outcrops next month on the way to northern Vancouver Island. 

It is rugged, remote and beautiful. Think trees and valleys for as far as the eye can see. Some of those hillsides on the horizon contain wonderful fossils, including this Coroniceras sp. with the truly marvellous keel.

By the time these ammonites were being buried in sediment, Wrangellia, the predominately volcanic terrane that now forms Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii, had made its way to the northern mid-latitudes.

Within the basal part of the sequence, sedimentary beds are found interbedded with lapilli and crystal tuffs. Here you'll see maroon tuffaceous sandstone, orange-grey sandstone, granule sandstone and conglomerate. Within them we find ammonites nestled in with gastropods and pelecypods. 

While the fossiliferous outcrop is quite small, the Bonanza group is much larger, estimated to be at least 1000 metres thick. The site is quite small and in an active logging area, so the window to collect is limited. 

We have been to the site many times. One one of the past trips, the drive up the mountain was thrilling as there had just been heavy rains and the road was washed out and narrowed until it was barely the width of our wheelbase and very, very steep. Closer to the top it narrowed to be just shy of the width of the vehicle — thrilling, to say the least. 

So scary that my passengers all got out as there was a high probability of going head-first over the edge. I was navigating by some handwritten field notes and a wee map on a paper napkin that should have read, "park at the bottom and hike up." 

Did we park at the bottom and hike up? No, we did not. 

The torrential rains of the Pacific Northwest had been working their magic on the hillside and slowly washing out the road until it slowly became more of a trail.

At the base of the hillside all looked well. Giddy for the fossils to come, we ventured off with a truck full of enthusiasm. Within 15 minutes of steep elevation gain, we had a wonderful view of the valley below. We were halfway up the mountain before I realized the error of my ways. The road twisted and turned then slowly narrowed to the width of my tires. Too narrow to turn around, so the only way was up. 

Graham Beard from Qualicum Beach was the fellow who showed me the site and drew the wee map for me. I cannot recall everyone on the trip, but Perry Poon was there — he shot a video of the drive up that he described as thrilling. I have never seen it but would like to one day — and so was Patricia Coutts with her lovely Doberman. 

She and I had just done a trip up to Goldbridge where the cliff we were on had turned into a landslide into a ravine so she was feeling understandably cautious about the power of Mother Nature. 

Picture the angle, the hood of my jeep riding high and hiding what remained of the road beneath and a lovely stick shift that made you roll backwards a wee bit with every move to put it into gear. So, without being able to see the very narrow path beneath, I had to just keep going. 

Both Perry and Patricia helped with filling in the potholes so my tires would have something to grip. 

I bent the frame on the jeep heading up and had some explaining to do when I returned it to the car rental place. 

As I recall, I wasn't in my ordinary vehicle but a rental because my car had been stolen the weekend before when I was away with John Fam and Dan Bowen collecting at Jurassic Point, an epic fossil site accessible only by boat on our wild west coast.

Fortuitous timing really, as they stole my car but I had unloaded my precious fossil collecting gear out of the trunk just days before.  

In the end, we found what we were looking for. Memekay yields a mix of ammonites, gastropods and bivalves. 

Many of them are poorly preserved. It was a hell of a ride but well worth the effort as we found some great fossils and with them more information on the palaeontology and geology of Vancouver Island. Just look at the keel on this beauty.

I would share the site information but it is now covered over with debris and inaccessible. One day, this whole region will be developed and the site will be opened up again. Until then, we'll have to enjoy what has been unearthed.

THE DUDLEY BUG: ROLLED TRILOBITES

A lovely rolled trilobite, Calymene blumenbachii,  from outcrops in the UK. This wee beauty is in the collections of the deeply awesome Theresa Paul Spink Dunn — or perhaps in her daughter Layla's collections as she is quite the budding palaeontologist. 

This Silurian beauty is from the Homerian, Wenlock Series, Wrens Nest, Dudley, UK.

I was passing through Qualicum this past week and had an impromptu visit with Graham and Tina Beard. 

They are lifelong friends and avid fossil collectors. Over the past few years, they have traveled to the UK and in passing, Graham mentioned that he had a chance to go to the outcrops where the Dudley Bug can be found. 

His timing was especially fortuitous as the Wenlock Edge quarry is closed now to further collecting but may be open to future research projects. We shall have to wait and see.

Calymene blumenbachii, sometimes erroneously spelled blumenbachi, is a species of trilobite found in the limestone quarries of the Wren's Nest in Dudley, England.

Nicknamed the Dudley Bug or Dudley Locust by an 18th-century quarryman, it became a symbol of the town and featured on the Dudley County Borough Council coat-of-arms. Calymene blumenbachii is commonly found in Silurian rocks (422.5-427.5 million years ago) and is thought to have lived in the shallow waters of the Silurian, in low energy reefs.

This particular species of Calymene — a fairly common genus in the Ordovician-Silurian — is unique to the Wenlock series in England and comes from the Wenlock Limestone Formation in Much Wenlock and the Wren's Nest in Dudley. 

These sites seem to yield trilobites more readily than any other areas on the Wenlock Edge, and the rock here is dark grey as opposed to yellowish or whitish as it appears on other parts of the Edge, just a few miles away, in Church Stretton and elsewhere suggesting local changes in the environment in which the rock was deposited. 

As an aside, while I was in the UK last, I attended a conference in London's Natural History Museum and given a private tour of some of their collections. It was with immense pride that I saw Graham Beard's kind donation to the museum snug up near Darwin. It seems the museum catalogues donations alphabetically so the two collections were quite close to one another. Two great men with a shared love of paleontology across the ages!

YORKSHIRE HISTORY: FOSSILS, TEXTILES AND URINE

Yorkshire Coast

You may recall the eight-metre Type Specimen of the ichthyosaur, Temnodontosaurus crassimanus, found in an alum quarry in Yorkshire, northern England.

The Yorkshire Museum was given this important ichthyosaur fossil back in 1857 when alum production was still a necessary staple of the textile industry. Without that industry, many wonderful specimens would likely never have been unearthed.

These quarries are an interesting bit of British history as they helped shape the Yorkshire Coast, created an entirely new industry and gave us more than a fixative for dyes. 

With them came the discovery of many remarkable fossil specimens and, oddly, local employment in the collection of urine.

In the 16th century, alum was essential in the textile industry as a fixative for dyes. 

By the first half of the 16th century, the clothing of the Low Countries, German states, and Scandinavia had developed in a different direction than that of England, France, and Italy, although all absorbed the sobering and formal influence of Spanish dress after the mid-1520s. Those fashions held true until the Inquisition when religious persecution, politics and fashion underwent a much-needed overhaul to something lighter.

Fashion in Medieval Livonia (1521): Albrecht Dürer

Elaborate slashing was popular, especially in Germany. In the depiction you see here, an artist pokes a bit of fun at Germanic fashion from the time. Bobbin lace arose from passementerie in the mid-16th century in Flanders, the Flemish Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium. Black was increasingly worn for the most formal occasions.

This century saw the rise of the ruff, which grew from a mere ruffle at the neckline to immense, slightly silly, cartwheel shapes. They adorned the necklines of the ultra-wealthy and uber-stylish men and women of the age.

At their most extravagant, ruffs required wire supports and were made of fine Italian reticella, a cutwork linen lace. You can imagine the many hours of skill and patience that would have gone into each piece to create the artful framework of these showy lace collars.

16th Century Fashion / Ruff Collars and Finery

In contrast to all that ruff, lace and cutwork linen, folk needed dyed fabrics. And to fix those dyes, they needed Alum. For a time, Italy was the source of that alum.

The Pope held a tidy monopoly on the industry, supplying both alum and the best dyes. He also did a nice trade in colourful and rare pigments for painting. And for a time, all was well with dandy's strutting their finery to the local fops in Britain.

All that changed during the Reformation. Great Britain, heathens as they were, were cut off from their Papal source and needed to fend for themselves.

The good Thomas Challoner took up the charge and set up Britain's first Alum works in Guisborough. Challoner looked to palaeontology for inspiration. Noticing that the fossils found on the Yorkshire coast were very similar to those found in the Alum quarries in Europe, he hatched a plan to set-up an alum industry on home soil. 

As the industry grew, sites along the coast were favoured as access to the shales and subsequent transportation was much easier.

Alum House, Photo: Joyce Dobson and Keith Bowers

Alum was extracted from quarried shales through a large scale and complicated process which took months to complete. 

The process involved extracting then burning huge piles of shale for 9 months, before transferring it to leaching pits to extract an aluminium sulphate liquor. This was sent along channels to the alum works where human urine was added.

At the peak of alum production, the industry required 200 tonnes of urine every year. That's the equivalent of all the potty visits of more than 1,000 people. Yes, strange but true.

The steady demand was hard to keep up with and urine became an imported resource from markets as far away as London and Newcastle upon Tyne in the northeast of England. Wooden buckets were left on street corners for folk to do their business then carted back to the south to complete the alum extraction process. The urine and alum would be mixed into a thick liquid. Once mixed, the aromatic slosh was left to settle and then the alum crystals were removed.

I'm not sure if this is a folktale or plain truth, but as the story goes, one knows when the optimum amount of alum had been extracted as you can pop an egg in the bucket and it floats on its own.

Alum House. Photo: Ann Wedgewood and Keith Bowers

The last Alum works on the Yorkshire Coast closed in 1871. This was due to the invention of manufacturing synthetic alum in 1855, then subsequently the creation of aniline dyes that contained their own fixative.

Many sites along the Yorkshire Coast bear evidence of the alum industry. These include Loftus Alum Quarries where the cliff profile is drastically changed by extraction and huge shale tips remain.

Further South are the Ravenscar Alum Works, which are well-preserved and enable visitors to visualize the processes which took place. The photos you see here are of Alum House at Hummersea. The first shows the ruin of Alum House printed on a postcard from 1906. The second (bottom) image shows the same ruin from on high with Cattersty Point in the background.

The good folk at the National Trust in Swindon are to thank for much of the background shared here. If you'd like to learn more about the Yorkshire area or donate to a very worthy charity, follow their link below.

Reference: https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/yorkshire-coast/features/how-alum-shaped-the-yorkshire-coast