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Almost 2 weeks ago I went with a small group from the rockhound club up to the Vancouver Island Paleontology Museum and the Courtenay & District Museum to see their fossils. Weather was too crummy to do an actual collecting field trip at any place! I guess it's OK to post pics here. I won't post anybody's face. The lighting and some of the display cases themselves presented problems for photography at both places, besides which it was kind of a whirlwind tour, so these shots are the best I could do. I'd say the poor lighting was the worst thing about both places, but we're dealing with small museums with small budgets here, so I figure that can be excused. First, Graham Beard gave us an informative tour of the VIPS in Qualicum Beach. It is a one-room fossil display, aimed primarily at educating the public, and Graham's tour was likewise, which suited us fine as most of the rockhounds know next to nothing about fossils. I think we all got more out of it than we would have if we'd been left to view it all on our own. He not only explained what was interesting about many of the pieces but also recounted the stories around how some of them were collected or acquired. He started at the 'types of preservation' showcase, which featured a piece from the Appian Way site up toward Campbell River which contains Eocene plants. It had been sliced and peeled to reveal fine cross-section detail of the plants. Several new species have been described from here. If you look closely at the slab leaning at an angle on the stand you can see a sheet partly peeled off: Heteromorphic ammonites from Hornby Island and V.I.: The big dark one in front, I have a piece of the same taxon from Mt Tzuhalem. Mine is missing the crook part but looks identical to the straight part. I thought it was from my mountain until Graham told me it was from up along the Inland Island Hwy near Courtenay. (Nothing to collect there now, as that was when the hwy was being built or widened). It didn't have a label and Graham couldn't remember so I'm still not sure what it's called!
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