What Do You Bring With You To Store Fossils

[Allosaurus]

So I'm in the process of planning a fossil trip that will last about 2 weeks or so (please note that I'm planning the trip to be around June 2015). I plan on going to some sites in Utah and Wyoming, but because the trip will be very long I'm trying to decide how to pack/store the fossils and protect them. I don't know all the sites yet, but I know for sure I will be going to the Green River Formation and consequently will (hopefully ) find some fish fossils. That being said I know fish fossils can be extremely delicate and easy to flake away, so what would you guys recommend for storing and transporting fossils? Any particular wrapping material or boxes?

[Missourian]

I'm pathetic, but.... old plastic grocery sacks, or a soda cup found along the side of the road. If I actually find something good, then I improvise.

[Wrangellian]

I have always used beer flats but it's not ideal and may not do at all for transport, but depending on the fossils and the quantity you end up with, you could buy a few rolls of paper towel and/or TP and put the wrapped fossils in boxes. For the really delicate stuff that can't be wrapped, all I can think of is the flats, perhaps with newspaper or paper towel or cotton/etc as bedding. Maybe also some loose pieces of cardboard to layer in between the wrapped fossils to help keep the weight of the top layers from crushing and grinding the ones on the bottom, at least when you're dealing with flat pieces like the Green River Fm.

PS make sure you write down the location of each find on the boxes or on a piece of paper in each box! It can be hard to remember this info accurately when you get home, especially if you let some time pass before you start to unpack and deal with the fossils.

[tmaier]

Everything mentioned above, and I love paper lunch bags and larger grocery bags. You can write notes on them.

And in a pinch, I have raided roadside garbage cans for packing material...

[Dave pom Allen]

what i take is a roll of tin(alluminum) foil news paper and corona beer boxs as they have handles and a lid

[obsessed1]

I like the big rolls of bubble wrap from Walmart for my fossil trips. I have wrapped Shark Tooth Hill matrix pieces, Crawfordsville crinoids and trilobites from Utah and had good luck with it.

[Bullsnake]

Here's something I came up with awhile back.

http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php?/topic/25775-tips-from-a-noob/#entry284438

[DeepTimeIsotopes]

Having experience with Green River fish I recommend lots of newspaper, plastic bags work great too. The trick is with the fish is to store them vertically so boxes are great to accomplish this.

[Fossildude19]

WIth the Green River fish, I too, have heard that it is best to store them vertically, so fruit crates, milk crates, wine cases/boxes or fruit boxes would be good for transporting them.

Bring lots of newspaper to put a layer between plates.

5 Gallon buckets would work well with the U-dig stuff, so long as you wrap the matrix you keep individually with newspapers.

The beauty of cardboard boxes is that they can be dismantled to lie flat, and then can be put back together using Packing tape.

When I am in the field, I bring ziplock baggies for small specimens, newspaper and bubblewrap for larger specimens, and a few back packs/satchels, for hauling out less fragile pieces of matrix.

Regards.

[RyanNREMTP]

Those large plastic cat litter buckets are great. For smaller stuff I like using new and unused urine sample cups.

[MgTattooer86]

Bubble wrap, news paper, gallon zip lock bags, prescription bottles or film canisters for little stuff, and a couple of shoe boxes.

[jpc]

I will repeat what others have said.... For green river fish, a sturdy beer or wine box or two to store them vertically for the trip. With newspapers and cardboard between. Also, bring a colored pencil to mark on the plates. You may need to circle very subtle fossils, but more likely you will have to mark which pieces go together in case you find a fish that is in two or three pieces.

[Allosaurus]

Thank you everybody so much!

So how much newspaper do you put between each fish fossil when arranged vertically? Would bubble wrap work better or worse than newspaper? About how many fish fossils do most people retrieve from the Green River? I'm trying to figure out how many boxes/crates to bring along. I'll be traveling in a large pick-up truck so space is definitely going to be a premium.

[DeepTimeIsotopes]

If you crumple up the newspaper and put it in between in plate than 4 to 5 pages in each gap will do for bigger plates, smaller plates though you could get away without crumpling the paper up. As for how many it all depends on what you are willing to keep and how long you go for. When I went I brought 3 huge plate back about 3' by 3' slabs and 4 boxes of smaller slabs so it all depends on what you are willing to take back with you. I only went for an hour and found 20 to 35 fish. The road to get to there is also extremely rough so anything to stabilize your cargo would be very wise to have.

[Missourian]

When there is a possibility of finding large pieces, I'll bring some large Xerox paper boxes and paper ream wrappings.

[Mike from North Queensland]

Another one I take is egg cartons as when you find the occasional small vertebrae column loose you can wrap them in toilet paper (dual use in the bush) then stack them in the correct order. Also applies to any small jigsaw type pieces. For large isolated pieces straight into a 20 kg bag that is easily seen so I can drive back and pick up with out carrying to far.

Mike

[kauffy]

I agree with all others methods and will further stress the need for a bunch of sharpies/ marker pens and labels!! The worst thing is coming to the end of a long trip, finding some loose fossils and you can't remember which site they came from... Book keeping is a must. In addition a field book complements this nicely, to jot down dates with location info and any other field observations. Often my field book is essential if I want to re-visit a site a few years later.

Goodluck!

[erose]

The beauty of newspaper is that it starts out taking up very little space. Once you crumple it it becomes a very serviceable padding material. And kauffy is right in making sure you have what you need to label everything well.

[Koss1959]

I love tin foil. It's just perfect. It's lightweight, doesn't take up much room, relatively cheap, very flexible and extremely shock absorbant. I could wrap an Ichthyosaur vert up in it, throw it above head height and let it land on rock and be confident it would survive in tact. Of course, I would never do that, though.

[squali]

I agree with the above recommendations. For sturdy items I. Use baggies or pill bottles with the prescription label removed. Try to avoid trouble. For fragile items, shells and such, tin foil can't be beat .

Crumple the foil then make a pouch to hold the fossil. I have some old tupperware I put the foil packets in.

Good advice about labeling if you go to more than one similar Site.

[John K]

another vote for bubble wrap. Also, lot's of duct tape.
We used the combination extensively during our last trip to Montana last summer. This Placenticerous was in 3 pieces when we found it, but made the trip home with no problem once it was fully wrapped:

[old dead things]

As many forum members know I dig a lot of fossil fish. Over the past 15 years I have hauled literally thousands of fish from the quarry to home. I stack them vertically in the back of the pickup, most times with no padding of any kind and drive the 300 miles home. Maybe in all those years I have broken a couple of fish. The past few years I have built a wooden box for my trailer, stack the fish and sprinkle sawdust over them, which packs them tightly( sorry I don't have a photo of this). The most dangerous time for breakage is the 12 miles or so out of the quarry to the paved road.

I didn't have much digging time this past year and these plates were stacked in the back of pickup with no padding and I lost one fish plate. They aren't as delicate as some may think, but that depends on the thickness of your plate. I guess I just don't really worry about it............now if you are going to mail them through the United States Post Office, they can break anything no matter how well padded they are.

For ammonites I use aluminum foil, this way if they break I have all the pieces in one place, but it is important that once you have them home, put a hole in the aluminum foil to prevent condensation which can damage your fossils.

Jim

[Cluros]

For my trilobites I use aluminum foil as it protects the fossil well and doesn't soak up water like newspaper. While a little expensive I can place a whole roll in my pack and I have never had a damaged piece. You can also label it with a sharpie. I would even use it on fossil fish as it slows down the drying out process. This is very important if you have ever collected from Alden, New York where trilobites can disintegrate when they dry out. It has given me time to stabilize some trilobites that would have fallen apart in newspaper before I got back to my car.