New paleo undergrad member

[Avery]

Hey hey. 

Call me Avery. I am an undergraduate paleontology student in Ottawa, ON, Canada. I have been hyperfixeated on fossils and prehistory for nearly all my life, and I am so glad to have finally made it into the field as a student, and starting next week, as an assistant researcher.

My facination started when I was 4 or 5, when my grandpa gave me a fish fossil, and my brother a mammoth tooth. As I got older and started learning more, I started to doubt the authenticity of the fossils, because why would my grandpa (a chiropractor) have a mammoth tooth, and just give it away to a sticky, clumsy, child? I talked to my mum and they are originals, apparently they had been passed down through generations, and it seems that in all likely hood, they were originally stolen/smuggled by my great x3 grandfather. VERY UNCOOL of him to do that, but also I don't think there's anyway to do anything about it: it is impossible to know where they rightfully belong.

Since then, I have garnered a small collection of fossils from local sellers and as gifts from friends/family. Besides the fish and an ungulate ankle, my collection consists entirely of trilobites and cephalopods including my most recent addition; a small Orthoceras cluster. I have never found any of my fossils myself, as I do not particularly like to go outside, and growing up in the GTA, almost all public greenspaces are nature conservations, and it is illegal to remove anything including rocks and fossils. 

For those who don't know, the Canadian Shield is a huge Precambrain craton. Precambrian stromatolites are especially abundant in the Ottawa-Gatineau area, however there are also many younger deposits containing invertebrate fossils which I want to start looking for. 

I joined the forum to look for fossil hunting tips/advice and to find suggestions for where to look in the Ottawa and Toronto region. 

(sorry for any spelling mistakes, I'm not going to read it over)

 

 

[Top Trilo]

Welcome from Colorado, USA! I've seen several really cool trilobites come out of Ontario.

[Kane]

Welcome from a former Ottawa native. Plenty of great little spots to find Ordovician goodies with a bit of exploration. 

[Fin Lover]

Welcome from South Carolina!

[Mark Kmiecik]

Welcome from Illinois.

[FossilDAWG]

Welcome to the Forum, Avery.  I used to live in Ottawa, and still visit family there once or twice a year.  I have a substantial collection of fossils from there, including crinoids, cystoids, edrioasteroids, trilobites, corals, brachiopods, cephalopods, snails, bivalves, and more.  On my return visits I have found it harder to find good fossils, but not impossible.  Construction sites often expose fossils, especially beautiful pyritized trilobites and orthocones in the black Billings shale.  There is a local natural history club that organizes good field trips; that would be worth joining.  I wonder about your comment about not liking going outdoors; that would seem to pose a barrier to actually exploring the geology and paleontology that the area has to offer.

 

Don

[Fossildude19]

Welcome to the Forum. 

 

Besides an aversion to the outdoors, lack of interest in grammar and spelling can be problematic for researchers. 

[jpc]

Welcome, and good luck with your fossil finds.  I assume GTA means Greater Toronto Area. 

 

..."as I do not particularly like to go outside"...

I fear this is representative of the young generations raised by computers.      

[fossilhunter21]

Welcome from Nebraska, USA! 

 

Cheers and Shalom,

 

-Micah

[FossilNerd]

Hello and welcome!  
 

Good luck with your studies, but like others, I fear you may have chosen the wrong profession if you don’t like to go outdoors and can’t be bothered to reread a post for spelling errors. 

[Gizmo]

Welcome aboard!