will brake again for brachipods.....

My job recently brought me back to Nashville so I ended up checking my luggage which included my mini pick mattock.   I came prepared this time with the correct gear…. steel-toes boots, fingerless gloves, Carhartt jacket and the most important, my pick mattock.  That piece of equipment made my second trip all the difference in “extracting” my finds.

I had around three hours of picking away at the Leipers Formation.  It was great being in the outdoors with the awesome fall scenery.  I even kicked up a couple of deer on the way to the site.  The weather was perfect, sunny and in the 60’s with the sun beating on my back and cliff wall.  The sun definitely helped make finding the geodized brachiopods easy, like diamonds in the rough.  The fossil collecting was therapeutic and I didn’t want it to end, but soon the evening shadow was cast over me.

I found a good assortment of upper Ordovician Period fossils, primarily brachipods with mainly Platystrophia, some Rafinesquina and a handful of Hebertella, gastropods and various bryozoans that were deposited approximately 445 million years ago.  Found one cephalopod that I ended up breaking in two while trying to pick it out.  It bummed me out, but luckily I caught the broken piece before it rolled down the cliff side to be camouflaged in the rocks below.

enjoy…