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Hello all! I always see very nice photos of fossils that have been very neatly cleaned and uncovered like the following: I was wondering how I might go about doing this as a beginner and/or what kind of materials react well/not so well when cleaning certain types of fossils. Thanks! -Em

Today was time for me to give my Shark presentation at the Onandaga County Free Library, in Syracuse, New York. Originally I was to do a presentation on sharks, for the kids in the morning, and a second presentation on New York trilobites, for adults, in the afternoon. Due to the death of a friend, I had to cancel the trilobite presentation to attend to funeral services. But I gave the presentation on sharks as I did not want to cancel that, and let the kids down, who had registered for this event with the library, in advance. I really enjoyed giving this presentation today. While I never claim to anyone about being an expert, I do enjoy sharing the knowledge that I do have, with others. There were about 16, of the 23 kids, who had signed up for this, as well as their parents. Not a large group, but that's ok. I talked a bit about sharks of the past, modern sharks, shark fossils, and how and where to find them. I only had an hour to talk, and the time seemed to fly by, but the smiles on the children's and parents faces made it rewarding. At the end of the discussion I gave each kid 2 sharkteeth and 2 stingray plates to take home.They all seemed very pleased with that. The teeth I gave away were all from my recent hunt from Cookie Cutter Creek, as I had plenty. The highlight was when one of the children approached me after the talk. She looked at me and whispered " You know, you talked just a little too much". I had to chuckle. I told her how much a appreciate constructive criticism.