10/18 Red Hill PA

Took a trip w/ the DVPS to the Academy of Natural Sciences Red Hill research site near Hyner, PA back on 10/18. My goal this trip was to find the small Devonian shark teeth that can be found at the site with some persistence. I got lucky and did score some Ageleodus pectinatus teeth. Here’s a cool link if you want to check out some info on them: http://www.devoniantimes.org/who/pages/ageleodus.html Even found two that are right next to each other on a piece from the contact layer that makes a really cool display piece.

Found lots of fish scales and some of the lobe-fin fish teeth that the site is known for. Unfortunately all of the teeth were broken in some way, shape or form and had to be glued back together. One smaller one did turn out quite well.

I spent most of the day in one spot and only was able to remove about a roughly two foot square block of fresh material from the cliff. The rock crumbles easily when you don’t want it too or is solid and unmovable at spots you want it to break. Best thing is to just follow any natural cracks and/or contacts and try to free whole chunks at a time.

What makes this site so cool is that it’s a tetrapod site, a very cool time in fish to land evolution. If you ever get a chance through a fossil club to check this site out do it, even just once. Because, truly, what sharks tooth hunters collection is truly complete without teeth from one of the first sharks ever known.

Sorry, my computer is back up but the scanner is still down so no pics for this post….

*** Please note that this is a research site and the ANS does reserve the right to keep any finds of scientific importance and unauthorized access will be prosecuted.