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The Ammonite Wall of Digne-Les-Bains: A Closer Look at This Geological Marvel, The Rockseeker Dalle à ammonites - Wikipedia - lots of pictures Another URL A paper is: Bert, D., Bousquet, V., Guiomar, M., Bariani, F., Hippolyte, J.C., Bromblet, P., Garciaz, J.L., Fleury, J., Mathieu, P., Pagès, J.S. and Tardieu, P., 2022. The Geotouristic Project “the Geological Adventure” to the Rescue of an Iconic World Heritage Geosite, the Ammonites Slab of Digne-les-Bains (National Geological Nature Reserve of Haute-Provence and Unesco Global Geopark, France). Geoheritage, 14(3), p.101. PDF of preprint of Bousquet et al. (2022) - Sorry, no figures Abstract and paywalled paper A field trip guidebook that includes the "ammonite slab" is: Livret-Guide d'excursion géologique, congrès de l'Association des paléontologues français, 3-5 Mai 2007 Yours, Paul H.

I've recently found some medium to large ammonites, mostly apparently coroniceras. They aren't perfectly preserved, but I would really like to do them justice and put the work in to prep them. However. One thing I'm finding insufferably tedious is removing all of the excess matrix before you even get near the ammonite. I have a scribe/pen (a Ken Mannion TT), but that doesn't really seem up to the task of removing large amounts of matrix. Does anyone have any tips? Also, when it comes to the prep - at least of the lias ones - I'm finding that there is basically no separation between the ammonite and the surrounding rock, so all I can do is slowly work away the rock surrounding the ammonite, leaving it rather rough looking (and invariably slightly dinged). This also, of course, seems to take forever. Is that just the way it is? I have heard you then need to sand them down? Surely there must be some kind of trick, or incantation which would help me? How do you avoid ruining the centre, if the outer whorl is this hard? It boggles the mind! I understand that this is a dark art, practiced by highly skilled experts in enormous secrecy from their hidden ammonite bunkers, but any tips would be very much appreciated at this stage! I'm going to tag @Terry Dactyll, because if anybody knows, it's that guy! Just for visual interest, here are a few photos of some of the ammonites in question: Ammonite from unknown original location but found in Somerset. I'll prep this from the back, assuming the back is intact beneath all the rock. Somerset partial. Looks crushed in the centre, but I don't mind that for practice. Did a bit of work on this tonight, and spent about 45 minutes cleaning a single rib on the outer whorl. Somerset ammonite partial. I'm not actually going to do anything to this, because I absolutely love it as it is. The incredible size (I calculated it'd be the best part of a metre/3 feet wide when whole), rustic preservation and encrusted oysters make this one of my favourite recent finds. It may not be complete, but it has character.