Tumido Prep Number 3

[Doctor Mud]

Wow Dr Mud - thats come out fantastic and got me itching to get back to my one!

Is there any reason you didnt expose more claw? I guess its because they will angle back towards the mouth too far.

Congrats man, you gotta be proud!

Hi 6ix - great that you are back on here. We've missed you!

Sounds like you have been busy.

I exposed as much claw as possible without starting to expose the underside. The claws are partially tucked underneath. The other tricky thing is that the claws curve towards the spines that point out from the front of the shell and the eyes. I left a little matrix around the spines on top of the large claw and didn't want to work to close to the eyes.

I certainly am proud. Also thankful for all the advice from TFF members that helped me along the way with this prep.

[Ludwigia]

Sounds like a nightmare!

At least with soft crabs there is usually matrix inside right up to the shell and gentle prepping and consolidation may help. That being said, sometimes there are voids with no matrix inside crabs. Don't want to jinx myself....but haven't seen one of those yet.

I wonder why the shell is easier to separate from the internal mold than the matrix?

I wonder about that myself sometimes. Perhaps because the outer side of the shell takes the brunt of the pressure during sedimentation so that during the following diagenesis when the shell's aragonite is transformed into calcite, the calcite also binds itself with the outer matrix, whereas the mold wouldn't be so strongly affected, leaving a clean separation layer there between it and the shell. I have the same problem very often with the ammonites I find at the Wutach or in layers with similar taphonomy.