Decoding the Geological Time Capsule: A Closer Look at How Fossils Form and Preserve Earth’s History Fossils are the remnants or traces of ancient organisms that provide valuable insights into Earth’s history. These tangible pieces of the past serve as a geological time capsule, allowing us to understand the evolution of life on our planet. […]
Hey there, fellow explorer! Have you ever held a rock in your hand and wondered about the stories it might tell? Imagine holding a piece of history, a fragment of a time when mammoths roamed and ferns were the size of trees. Fossils are our window into the past, a tangible connection to life’s grand […]
Across the vastness of our ocean floors, Trilobites, recognized by their distinctive 3-lobed, 3-segmented form, roamed for nearly 300 million years. These ancient marine animals made their debut on earth around the beginning of the Cambrian Period (some 542 million years ago). During that time they dominated the seas, surviving and thriving beneath the waves. […]
Here is a handy reference chart for Geologic Time. Feel free to share. If you post to another website please give us credit and a link back.
When we had our school in Colorado, our students loved the boulder-rimmed sandbox. The giant rocks were great for little bodies to begin their first bouldering escapades, there was a deep indentation that felt like a cave for pretending so many historical scenarios, and then there were the fossils. You see, about four […]
Miraculously, life appeared on earth nearly 3.5 billion years ago in the form of microbes. By the time of the Cambrian explosion, life forms were highly developed. Consider the trilobite. (If you’ve been following my blog you know it’s one of my personal favorites!) It has a chitinous covering that was made of dozens of […]
Snail Relatives…Who knows? It’s been a “snail-y” summer here is SoCal. I have a new appreciation for the plight faced in Big Little Farm. (If you haven’t seen it, be sure you do. It’s inspiring and hope-producing!) I guess it was just a matter of time when we’d have one of the modern little buggers […]
Could it be? Was this “bug” walking through my living room a remnant of the trilobite species? I’d seen pill bugs before, but this bug looked to have LOBES! And three of them at that! The child inside of me was beyond excited, thrilled…not quantifiable. I hopped onto Google (of course). There I found a […]
How’d you like to split an ordinary-looking gray rock and find this beauty? You can at U-Dig Fossils near Delta, Utah in western Millard County. The quarry is literally acres of Wheeler Shale, laid down during the Cambrian Period approximately 507 million years ago. Trilobites were prolific inhabitants of the Cambrian seas that covered the […]
Inevitably, when I’m talking fossils, folks drop the name of their favorite. Do you have one? Just one? My passion for fossils grew out of my love for playing in natural settings. I was one of those lucky kids who was NOT a “last child in the woods”. I grew up in a place and […]
