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Showing results for tags 'Ecotours'.
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Incredible 3 Generation Fossil Hunt with LOTS of Pictures!
Bev posted a topic in Fossil Hunting Trips
This was a truly incredible hunt. Please be patient with me as this will take several replies as there are LOTS of pictures and a story to tell. I will say "The End" when I'm done. :-) This was a private hunt booked through the Eagle Bluff Environmental Learning Center, Ecotours, for three generations of the same family. They were experienced fossil hunters and it showed! I'll give you a teaser of the TWO best finds! Praecupulocrinus conjugans as IDed for crinoid expert Crinus in this post: http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/66595-beautifully-articulated-ordovician-crinoid/ AND A beautiful whole trilobite from the Decorah Shale which I believe to be an Anataphrus borreaus, that is what we usually pull out of this site, but it needs more prep to be sure. Read on for the WHOLE trip report... It was a beautiful July day in southeast Minnesota for fossil hunting. Temps in the 70s, sunshine, a breeze, low humidity and we had just had two torrential rains that washed out a whole new batch of fossils. The bluff country if SE MN is part of the Driftless... http://www.bluffcountryfossils.net/blog/mysteries-of-the-driftless-video/ and considered one of the most beautiful areas in North America - and very fossiliferous! The Eagle Bluff bus arrived and we started out with about an hour tour at my place, Whispering Winds in Spring Valley, of the fossil gardens and fossil prep barn. With three children ages 5-9, I set up my dino area and showed them a young pigeon as an example of what a baby dinosaur may have looked like as all birds are descended from the dinosaurs. Thanks to the generosity of TFF members I was able to give them a REAL dinosaur bone collected in Wyoming and fossil shark and stingray teeth collected in Morocco. And they had a blast in the fossil sandbox fill with St. Peter Formation sand, fossils and minerals. Then off to Masonic Park which too me is the perfect fossil park! This limestone cliff shows the Prosser and Stewartville members of the Galena Formation wonderfully. A branch of the Root River runs below the cliff and not only Ordovician fossils but also Native American artifacts and Ice Age fossils (mammoth teeth) have been collected here. It also has a cave, an abandoned quarry, and even a hidden stream coming out from beneath a bluff with great fossil hunting on both sides of the road. Hunting the roadside ditches. From there we went to a lovely long road cut that includes both the Stewartville and Prosser members of the Galena Formation. Continued...- 23 replies
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- Anataphrus borreaus
- Crinoids
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