British Columbia Paleontology Education Booth at the BC Rock and Gem Show

[BrennanThePaleoDude]

A few weeks ago I, along with the Vancouver Paleontological Society hosted a large table display at the annual BC Rock and Gem Show in Chilliwack! Every year I am invited to educate the public at this three day event. British Columbia's lower mainland lacks museums that have local fossils on display which is very unfortunate due to the high diversity of important and spectacular fossil sites in the area! I make sure to cover as much as I can at these shows and events, especially on the Burgess Shale (since it is so incredible and most people don't even know the site is in our Provence). This year was special as I was a part of the research and naming of Hainosaurus boubker, a new species of mosasaur most of you are now familiar with! I had the chance to share it at the show and really thank all the amazing people that have helped bring it to life! Our study was funded by the Association of Applied Paleontological Sciences’ Charles H. Sternberg Scholarship for vertebrate fossil research and without their support, our study would not have been possible! Huge thank you to the members of the AAPS!

 

Photo 1: Multiple table booth with parts of my personal collection which I have geared over the years to be presentable to the public for education!

 

Photo 2: Dan Bowden, Brennan Martens and John Fam of the VanPS along with a life sized Hainosaurus boubker banner! 

 

Photo 3: I am setting up a Burgess Shale themed section of table containing specimens from Utah and China!

 

Photo 4: John Fam, Dan Bowden and Brennan Martens with John Fam's two display cases filled with fossils (ammonites, decapods, bivalves) from Vancouver Island

 

Photo 5: My two display cases with Burgess Shale themed plushies and a special Hainosaurus boubker feature highlighting the many artists and collaborators involved with the project!

Edited May 30, 2023 by BrennanThePaleoDude

[Tidgy's Dad]

Excellent.

Thank you for sharing. 

[BrennanThePaleoDude]

A closer look at the Hainosaurus boubker special feature display case!

Edited May 31, 2023 by BrennanThePaleoDude

[BrennanThePaleoDude]

A closer look at the plushies of the Burgess Shale display case!

[BrennanThePaleoDude]

Some closer shots of our table display!

[BrennanThePaleoDude]

John Fam brought some beautiful leaves and a massive footprint from the Chuckanut slide in Washington!

 

[digit]

Wonderful displays and terrific imagery so we can all feel that we were virtually there. Thanks for inviting us along to this show!

 

 

Cheers.

 

-Ken

[Norki]

Here's some photos I took of John Fam's display of Nanaimo Group fossils (click for full resolution):

 

 

Edited May 31, 2023 by Norki

[pachy-pleuro-whatnot-odon]

Way to go, Brennan! Those are some great displays you managed to set up there with the VanPS!  Really love the H. boubker display and poster, of course (how could I not ). And that Burgess Shale pluchies sections is just wack! Makes me wonder who they're made for, though, as I'm having a hard time imagining young children getting truly excited about having a worm, Opabinia or Hallucigenia pluche as their favourite bedtime animal. Although, they do, admittedly, look very cool and, I guess, not too different from some Pokémon, so our son (six) might actually really love these!

 

In any case: well done!

[Wrangellian]

Wow, I haven't seen many displays of Vancouver Island fossils as good as that over here on Vancouver Island....

Very nice.   You guys have put a lot of work into this. All my favourite things in one place! Chengjiang, Utah, Eager Fm, Bull River, etc. etc.... and Vancouver Island.

The plushie case is hilarious! I guess when you can't display actual Burgess fossils, display plushies instead.

Questions: Where is that big scaphopod from, to the right in John Fam's 2nd case?

Is that Chuckanut footprint definitely a footprint? I'm having trouble seeing it, and I don't know if it's because the photo isn't optimal or it's not really there.

Is that Bull River Devonian stuff definitely Lower Devonian, then? Label says "Pre-Middle Devonian rock". Do you have any publications on that site? Also for that matter, any guides to the trilobites of the Bull River Valley? It looks like you do behind the case there. I collected at those sites in one hectic 4-day trip a few years ago.

Quibble: You make it sound like the Lower Mainland has many fossil sites, when you say "British Columbia's lower mainland lacks museums that have local fossils on display which is very unfortunate due to the high diversity of important and spectacular fossil sites in the area!" but I think you mean the various sites outside of the Lower Mainland..?

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Wrangellian

[jdp]

On 6/19/2023 at 7:56 PM, Wrangellian said:

Quibble: You make it sound like the Lower Mainland has many fossil sites, when you say "British Columbia's lower mainland lacks museums that have local fossils on display which is very unfortunate due to the high diversity of important and spectacular fossil sites in the area!" but I think you mean the various sites outside of the Lower Mainland..?

 

 

I think the main issue spoken to here is that BC's paleo museums are the RBCM in Victoria and the Tumbler Ridge Museum. There needs to be a museum in Vancouver...museums serve specific community education roles that you just can't get when the museum is a multi-hour commute away (e.g. school field trips, youth and adult classes, etc). The primary problem is that the natural history museum in Vancouver is the Beaty at UBC, and for a variety of dysfunctional reasons UBC basically refuses to hire paleontologists. The Beaty has recently hired someone (I think Bruce Archibald?) to start curating that collection, but the collection is still extremely small with no real research presence. This is just simply not going to change unless someone with some money in Vancouver endows a permanent vertebrate paleontologist position at the Beaty, because the biology department at UBC (which oversees the Beaty) is completely unwilling to make a paleo hire.

 

Sort of the same sort of specifically Canadian gong show that keeps Calgary from building a public-facing museum space to serve their 1.3m and growing population, though there the problem is the RTMP vehemently opposes any effort to build a facility there because it would cut into their funding and admissions.

[jdp]

As for the trilobites, IIRC, that whole area of the Rockies has a pretty big uncomformity between the Upper Cambrian and Middle Devonian. Those trilobites all look quite Cambrian to me. The only chunk of rock I've seen in that region that might be Lower Devonian is a small estuarine/continental unit that crops out intermittently and I've never seen trilobites in those rocks (it's almost all fish bone, and predominantly heterostracan, although plants and freshwater inverts turn up from time to time). There's more extensive marine Lower Devonian in the northern part of the province (as well as some underlying Ordovician) but I would be surprised if there were extensive marine units of Lower Devonian age in the Cranbrook area.

[Wrangellian]

14 hours ago, jdp said:

I think the main issue spoken to here is that BC's paleo museums are the RBCM in Victoria and the Tumbler Ridge Museum. There needs to be a museum in Vancouver...museums serve specific community education roles that you just can't get when the museum is a multi-hour commute away (e.g. school field trips, youth and adult classes, etc). The primary problem is that the natural history museum in Vancouver is the Beaty at UBC, and for a variety of dysfunctional reasons UBC basically refuses to hire paleontologists. The Beaty has recently hired someone (I think Bruce Archibald?) to start curating that collection, but the collection is still extremely small with no real research presence. This is just simply not going to change unless someone with some money in Vancouver endows a permanent vertebrate paleontologist position at the Beaty, because the biology department at UBC (which oversees the Beaty) is completely unwilling to make a paleo hire.

 

Sort of the same sort of specifically Canadian gong show that keeps Calgary from building a public-facing museum space to serve their 1.3m and growing population, though there the problem is the RTMP vehemently opposes any effort to build a facility there because it would cut into their funding and admissions.

I thought the Geological Survey of Canada in Vancouver held a pretty good collection of BC fossils, though I've not been there in person (and I understand they send type specimens to Ottawa). I could easily donate my local fossils to them, as Jim Haggart is willing to come over to pick them up from me, and has done so already to get all my inoceramids and a few other things. There are 3 museums housing fossils (local/BC and otherwise) here on Vancouver Island, but for some reason or other it's a much more difficult thing donating to them, much to my chagrin.

[Wrangellian]

14 hours ago, jdp said:

As for the trilobites, IIRC, that whole area of the Rockies has a pretty big uncomformity between the Upper Cambrian and Middle Devonian. Those trilobites all look quite Cambrian to me. The only chunk of rock I've seen in that region that might be Lower Devonian is a small estuarine/continental unit that crops out intermittently and I've never seen trilobites in those rocks (it's almost all fish bone, and predominantly heterostracan, although plants and freshwater inverts turn up from time to time). There's more extensive marine Lower Devonian in the northern part of the province (as well as some underlying Ordovician) but I would be surprised if there were extensive marine units of Lower Devonian age in the Cranbrook area.

Yes, those trilobites in the cases are Cambrian. The piece that is labeled "Pre-Middle Devonian" (not a trilobite) I suspect is from a site by the river further up the valley that we stopped at also during our trip there in 2019. Typical Devonian limestone stuff - corals, brachiopods, snails (but no trilos). I did not know what part of the Devonian it was from, but someone who looked at my pieces suggested Middle Devonian. Maybe there is another site, or there is conflicting information...

Edited June 27, 2023 by Wrangellian

[jdp]

9 hours ago, Wrangellian said:

I thought the Geological Survey of Canada in Vancouver held a pretty good collection of BC fossils, though I've not been there in person (and I understand they send type specimens to Ottawa). I could easily donate my local fossils to them, as Jim Haggart is willing to come over to pick them up from me, and has done so already to get all my inoceramids and a few other things. There are 3 museums housing fossils (local/BC and otherwise) here on Vancouver Island, but for some reason or other it's a much more difficult thing donating to them, much to my chagrin.

 

I am not sure if there are some remaining collections of the GSC or not; I know Ottawa recalled a bunch of the GSC collections from Alberta a few years back, and wouldn't be surprised if the same happened in BC, which generally has a reputation of caring a lot less about paleo than Alberta does. Regardless of that, though, the GSC is just simply not in a position to provide the sorts of educational experiences (exhibits, classes, field trips, public speakers, etc.) that you get from having a major natural history museum easily accessible within the city. It's a matter of exhibit space, personnel, finances, and mission, not just quality of the collections. A lot of the things I'm talking about in terms of function (e.g. public-facing classes, large exhibit spaces, high quality exhibits) are only possible if you have the staffing (e.g. education people, exhibits people, media people, etc.) and dedicated spaces (permanent exhibit spaces, rotating exhibit spaces, classrooms, exhibit fabrication facilities) to provide those services.  I think the Beaty should be that institution but it won't be so long as hiring at UBC remains the same, and that culture may take 10-20 years to change if it ever does.

 

My perspective here comes from having grown up in Pittsburgh with immediate access to the Carnegie Museum, having spent the past twelve years in Calgary, and now living in Chicago. It is utterly insane to me that two of the top 5 largest cities in Canada just simply do not have anything resembling a serious museum (and Calgary barely has an art museum, too), particularly when those two cities are a major tech hub and a major geoscience hub. This is generally a net negative for Canada and for Canadians.

[jdp]

9 hours ago, Wrangellian said:

Typical Devonian limestone stuff - corals, brachiopods, snails (but no trilos). I did not know what part of the Devonian it was from, but someone who looked at my pieces suggested Middle Devonian. Maybe there is another site, or there is conflicting information...

 

Middle Devonian sounds right. The base of the Devonian sequence in that area is Yahatinda Formation or equivalent, which has previously been dated to Givetian but is probably a bit older. That's the freshwater channel deposit unit I mentioned above. There appears to be a smaller unconformity above the Yahatinda, but the marine units overlying it are all Givetian age.

 

I'd be very curious to see if those channel facies turn up in that area of BC. We've been working them for a while on the Alberta side of the border, but there are a few isolated fossils from the BC side (including a relatively nice relatively large placoderm that's here at the FMNH) but how those relate to the channels on the Alberta side of the border is not clear at all. They might be the same age, or they might not, but the rock units themselves are not continuous.

[Wrangellian]

16 hours ago, jdp said:

I am not sure if there are some remaining collections of the GSC or not; I know Ottawa recalled a bunch of the GSC collections from Alberta a few years back, and wouldn't be surprised if the same happened in BC, which generally has a reputation of caring a lot less about paleo than Alberta does. Regardless of that, though, the GSC is just simply not in a position to provide the sorts of educational experiences (exhibits, classes, field trips, public speakers, etc.) that you get from having a major natural history museum easily accessible within the city. It's a matter of exhibit space, personnel, finances, and mission, not just quality of the collections. A lot of the things I'm talking about in terms of function (e.g. public-facing classes, large exhibit spaces, high quality exhibits) are only possible if you have the staffing (e.g. education people, exhibits people, media people, etc.) and dedicated spaces (permanent exhibit spaces, rotating exhibit spaces, classrooms, exhibit fabrication facilities) to provide those services.  I think the Beaty should be that institution but it won't be so long as hiring at UBC remains the same, and that culture may take 10-20 years to change if it ever does.

 

My perspective here comes from having grown up in Pittsburgh with immediate access to the Carnegie Museum, having spent the past twelve years in Calgary, and now living in Chicago. It is utterly insane to me that two of the top 5 largest cities in Canada just simply do not have anything resembling a serious museum (and Calgary barely has an art museum, too), particularly when those two cities are a major tech hub and a major geoscience hub. This is generally a net negative for Canada and for Canadians.

True, if you're talking about fossil museums open to the public. I guess I'm lucky to have 3 of them here on the Island within a couple hours' drive, but that's at least partly because we have fossils here with dedicated volunteer fossil nuts running them, and because the provincial museum is in Victoria though of course the majority of the collection there is not on public display. I just wish they were a little more amenable to receiving donations, whether for display or research, don't care, but the other 2 museums are smaller and I'm not sure how much public funding they get, when even the RBCM complains about how little money they receive. (Tell me about that reputation of not caring about paleo.  I think it's a shame how little Burgess material we have down here when other places [ROM, Smithsonian] have tons of it.)

I might ask Jim next time I see him about what they have at the GSC, but previously he invited me to tour their collection, I just never took him up on it. He did say type specimens went to Ottawa, implying that the rest remained in Vancouver. Anyway it seems like a regular thing to get a tour of the back rooms if you donate something at least - I did get a tour of the RBCM collection when I donated there. Not the same as Joe Q Public being able to wander in and be wowed, I know.

Edited June 28, 2023 by Wrangellian

[palaeopix]

On 6/19/2023 at 5:56 PM, Wrangellian said:

Wow, I haven't seen many displays of Vancouver Island fossils as good as that over here on Vancouver Island....

Very nice.   You guys have put a lot of work into this. All my favourite things in one place! Chengjiang, Utah, Eager Fm, Bull River, etc. etc.... and Vancouver Island.

The plushie case is hilarious! I guess when you can't display actual Burgess fossils, display plushies instead.

Questions: Where is that big scaphopod from, to the right in John Fam's 2nd case?

Is that Chuckanut footprint definitely a footprint? I'm having trouble seeing it, and I don't know if it's because the photo isn't optimal or it's not really there.

Is that Bull River Devonian stuff definitely Lower Devonian, then? Label says "Pre-Middle Devonian rock". Do you have any publications on that site? Also for that matter, any guides to the trilobites of the Bull River Valley? It looks like you do behind the case there. I collected at those sites in one hectic 4-day trip a few years ago.

Quibble: You make it sound like the Lower Mainland has many fossil sites, when you say "British Columbia's lower mainland lacks museums that have local fossils on display which is very unfortunate due to the high diversity of important and spectacular fossil sites in the area!" but I think you mean the various sites outside of the Lower Mainland..?

 

Brennan’s a busy guy so he may not address you questions right away, so I can answer in his place.

 

First off with regards to the Island Collections. This is but a fraction of John’s collection and it is one of the finest collections out there. There are equivalent collections on the Island made by various collectors (Tim Skippy Miller, Rick Ross, Dan Bowen and Terry Thomas are a few). John started collecting on the Island in his early teens (maybe earlier) with his dad.

 

I believe the scaphopod is from the Westcoast of the Island (I can check with John).

 

The Chuckanut piece is incomplete but if you see it in person it you see that it is a footprint.

 

The Bull River Devonian stuff is early middle Devonian. I don’t recall the formation (I’ll check on that). Some papers have been done on the stuff, but they are quite dated. Nearby further down the Bull River FSR is an equally interesting Ordovician site.

 

There are two monographs on Bull River Trilobites. One was published in 1998 and was written by Brian Chatterton and Rolf Ludvigsen. The other monograph was published in 2016 and was written by Brian Chatterton and Stacey Gibb. There have also been three or four papers written on the trilobites.

 

And finally, there are a small number of sites in and around Vancouver. Several are within the greater Vancouver area (Metro Vancouver, Abbotsford and Chilliwack). Other sites like those along Harrison Lake are close by.

 

I hope this answers some of you questions.

 

Dan

[palaeopix]

On 6/19/2023 at 5:56 PM, Wrangellian said:

Wow, I haven't seen many displays of Vancouver Island fossils as good as that over here on Vancouver Island....

Very nice.   You guys have put a lot of work into this. All my favourite things in one place! Chengjiang, Utah, Eager Fm, Bull River, etc. etc.... and Vancouver Island.

The plushie case is hilarious! I guess when you can't display actual Burgess fossils, display plushies instead.

Questions: Where is that big scaphopod from, to the right in John Fam's 2nd case?

Is that Chuckanut footprint definitely a footprint? I'm having trouble seeing it, and I don't know if it's because the photo isn't optimal or it's not really there.

Is that Bull River Devonian stuff definitely Lower Devonian, then? Label says "Pre-Middle Devonian rock". Do you have any publications on that site? Also for that matter, any guides to the trilobites of the Bull River Valley? It looks like you do behind the case there. I collected at those sites in one hectic 4-day trip a few years ago.

Quibble: You make it sound like the Lower Mainland has many fossil sites, when you say "British Columbia's lower mainland lacks museums that have local fossils on display which is very unfortunate due to the high diversity of important and spectacular fossil sites in the area!" but I think you mean the various sites outside of the Lower Mainland..?

 

I put those trilobite guides behind the case of Bull River trilobites together for our 2022 trip to Cranbrook. Many of the trilobites in the case were donated to the VanPS by me for their education programs.

[Wrangellian]

10 hours ago, palaeopix said:

I put those trilobite guides behind the case of Bull River trilobites together for our 2022 trip to Cranbrook. Many of the trilobites in the case were donated to the VanPS by me for their education programs.

Hi Dan, Long time no see.  Yes that answers a lot, thanks. If you figure out the name of that Devonian formation, pls let me know.

The Ordovician site sounds interesting... I don't think they even mentioned it to us when we were up there.

[jdp]

On 6/28/2023 at 1:49 AM, Wrangellian said:

True, if you're talking about fossil museums open to the public. I guess I'm lucky to have 3 of them here on the Island within a couple hours' drive, but that's at least partly because we have fossils here with dedicated volunteer fossil nuts running them, and because the provincial museum is in Victoria though of course the majority of the collection there is not on public display. I just wish they were a little more amenable to receiving donations, whether for display or research, don't care, but the other 2 museums are smaller and I'm not sure how much public funding they get, when even the RBCM complains about how little money they receive. (Tell me about that reputation of not caring about paleo.  I think it's a shame how little Burgess material we have down here when other places [ROM, Smithsonian] have tons of it.)

I might ask Jim next time I see him about what they have at the GSC, but previously he invited me to tour their collection, I just never took him up on it. He did say type specimens went to Ottawa, implying that the rest remained in Vancouver. Anyway it seems like a regular thing to get a tour of the back rooms if you donate something at least - I did get a tour of the RBCM collection when I donated there. Not the same as Joe Q Public being able to wander in and be wowed, I know.

 

Yeah, it is astounding that ongoing Burgess Shale collections are still going to the ROM instead of being reposited in BC.

[jdp]

On 6/28/2023 at 9:35 AM, palaeopix said:

The Bull River Devonian stuff is early middle Devonian. I don’t recall the formation (I’ll check on that). Some papers have been done on the stuff, but they are quite dated. Nearby further down the Bull River FSR is an equally interesting Ordovician site.

 

There are two monographs on Bull River Trilobites. One was published in 1998 and was written by Brian Chatterton and Rolf Ludvigsen. The other monograph was published in 2016 and was written by Brian Chatterton and Stacey Gibb. There have also been three or four papers written on the trilobites.

 

Thanks for the info here, Dan. Do you know if there are any nearshore facies in that sequence? I know there's a disjunct exposure of "Yahantinda" in Height of the Rockies PP that has produced fossil fishes of approximately that age, so I'm wondering if that's the same formation.

[palaeopix]

On 6/28/2023 at 6:30 PM, Wrangellian said:

Hi Dan, Long time no see.  Yes that answers a lot, thanks. If you figure out the name of that Devonian formation, pls let me know.

The Ordovician site sounds interesting... I don't think they even mentioned it to us when we were up there.

Yes, it’s been awhile since I was around the forum on a regular basis. I’m trying to keep busy, but I’ve been having some issues with my health.

 

Anyway, the Cranbrook Museum has a collection of the Devonian fossils. We visited the museum in 2020 and again in 2022. We also visited and collected at the Bull River Devonian site. Labels on the fossils in the museum say Devonian Harrogate Formation. From what I’ve seen from searches of the internet the Harrogate is Middle Devonian.

 

 I’m not sure when the Ordovician site was discovered. We have visited it yet, but it’s on our to do list during our next trip to the area.

[palaeopix]

On 6/29/2023 at 7:11 AM, jdp said:

 

Yeah, it is astounding that ongoing Burgess Shale collections are still going to the ROM instead of being reposited in BC.

It most certainly is astounding! 

[palaeopix]

On 6/30/2023 at 6:23 AM, jdp said:

 

Thanks for the info here, Dan. Do you know if there are any nearshore facies in that sequence? I know there's a disjunct exposure of "Yahantinda" in Height of the Rockies PP that has produced fossil fishes of approximately that age, so I'm wondering if that's the same formation.

I’m not sure. I’ve heard about the Yahatinda finds, but haven’t really looked at the papers yet. The stuff from the Bull River is labeled as Harrogate Formation. I can contact Guy Santucci at the museum to get more information.