Monthly Archives: August 2011

Foundations for filter feeders

Posted on August 29, 2011 by

Life is hard is you’re a sessile animal. Admittedly, there’s a certain couch-potato attraction to sitting around all day, waiting for food to blunder into your mouth. But there are lots of challenges that come with being anchored to a … Continue reading →

Posted in Invertebrate Paleontology | Leave a comment

A few minor points on the Virginia earthquake

Posted on August 24, 2011 by

I had not initially intended to do a post on yesterday’s earthquake in Virginia, mostly because there are a lot of structural geologists and seismologists that can do a much better job of describing this event than I can. For … Continue reading →

Posted in Carmel Church Geology, Carmel Church Quarry, General Geology | Tagged | Leave a comment

A few hours of cleaning…

Posted on August 22, 2011 by

One of the obstacles we face at Carmel Church is weathering. In Virginia’s wet and variable climate weathering rates are very high. Moreover, at Carmel Church the sediment chemistry is such that the sediment becomes very acidic when exposed to … Continue reading →

Posted in Carmel Church odontocetes, Carmel Church Quarry, Chesapeake Group | Tagged | 4 Comments

From the Collections Room (Planocephalosaurus robinsonae)

Posted on August 18, 2011 by

It has been almost two years since I last talked about VMNH’s collection of Triassic fossils from the fissure-fill deposits of Britain. These sediments were deposited in caves and sinkholes that had been dissolved out of Carboniferous limestones. Apparently Triassic … Continue reading →

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George Washington, canals, and geology

Posted on August 12, 2011 by

I grew up in Virginia, in the middle of the Blue Ridge Mountains. At 18, when I went off to Minnesota to start college, I had no intention of returning to Virginia except to occasionally visit relatives. Little did I … Continue reading →

Posted in General Geology, Science and Technology | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Mysticete squamosal revisited

Posted on August 8, 2011 by

During our most recent Carmel Church excavation, we collected a squamosal (cheek and ear region) from a small baleen whale (above). Since returning to the museum I’ve had a chance to clean this specimen and compare it to other bones … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged | 3 Comments

New donations

Posted on August 5, 2011 by

After returning from Carmel Church I decided to take a few days off, which is the reason for my lack of recent posts. The pace should pick up a bit next week. But this does give me a chance to … Continue reading →

Posted in Chesapeake Group | Tagged | Leave a comment