Extracting bone from Aust Cliff matrix

[AGW2]

Hi everyone,

 

I am new to fossil hunting and recently took a trip to my local spot at Aust cliff in Bristol. I found some small chunks of bone bed about the size of a golf ball along the foreshore which I can see have small bits of bone including teeth. 

 

Does anyone have a good technique to extracting these without damaging the interesting bits.

 

Cheers

[Fossildude19]

Moved to Fossil Preparation.

 

Welcome to the Forum.  

Air scribes and air abrasion are the usual methods, although dental picks, scribes, and rotary tools can be used with some success, depending on hardness of the surrounding matrix. 

A search through this Forum will bring up techniques.  

 

 

[Ptychodus04]

Post some photos when you can get some. The right prep attack is heavily dependent on the specimen.

 

Always approach your preparation with this mindset: remove the matrix from the fossil, not the fossil from the matrix. Whatever you remove gets broken and this philosophical understanding will save you from many unintended breaks.

[JohnBrewer]

On 12/11/2019 at 3:41 PM, AGW2 said:

Hi everyone,

 

I am new to fossil hunting and recently took a trip to my local spot at Aust cliff in Bristol. I found some small chunks of bone bed about the size of a golf ball along the foreshore which I can see have small bits of bone including teeth. 

 

Does anyone have a good technique to extracting these without damaging the interesting bits.

 

Cheers

Aust bone bed is tricky. The bone (brown) is very fragile as are the coprolites (black). Teeth are more resilient. You can try vinegar providing you coat the bone/coprolite with Paraloid as you go. Using a pneumatic pen isn’t really useful as it tends to shatter the fossils as the bone bed is quite granular albeit very hard. Having said that I have extracted vertebrae successfully with a pen. Try the vinegar method with a pin vice and go slow on a rough bit of matrix.  

[Tidgy's Dad]

I always used a pin and patience. 

It was always freezing and windy at Aust.

Brrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!!!!!