Summer 2004
FEATURES
Fossil
Unearthed During Construction of Integrated Science Facility
Construction
workers on campus unearthed a fossil from the Middle Devonian era while
removing rock during the construction of the College’s Integrated
Science Facility. The specimen, discovered on May 25, was turned over
to the College’s Geology Department, and, according to Professor
of Geological Sciences Jeff Over, the fossil is about 385 million years
old, when Geneseo was only about 15 to 20 degrees south of the equator.
The specimen, Spyroceras, was a squid-like creature with a conical shell.
The Geneseo sample is essentially intact in a black shale rock, known
as the Geneseo Shale, and is about 15 centimeters long.
The Spyroceras was a carnivorous nautiloid cephalopod. An invertebrate,
it was near the top of the food chain and survived by eating other fish,
Over said.
"It’s rare to find fossils in the Geneseo Shale," he added.
While fossils are "relatively common in Western New York," the
Geneseo Shale – which smells like oil – contain very few fossils,
Over said.
"That’s what was neat about finding this one," he said.
The Geneseo Shale is within the Givetian Stage in the Middle Devonian.
It was found about three to five feet below the top of rock, or approximately
15 feet below old grade, approximately 151’ west of the earth science
lab in Greene Hall.
The Geneseo Shale, which is the lowest formation in the Genesee Group,
also contains other interesting items. Among them: pyrite, an iron-bearing
mineral also known as "fool’s gold"; clams, or ptericania,
a planktic organism; and brachiopods, bottom-dwelling suspension feeders.
The Devonian era was the "age of fish." During the Middle Devonian,
North America was 15 to 20 degree south of the equator. The area was covered
by an eiperic sea, and the closest land to Geneseo would have been Wisconsin
to the west and Albany to the east, Over said.
Over said he plans to use the discovery in the classroom and display it
in Greene Hall’s first-floor display case. The case includes a poster
of the ocean floor that shows several Spyroceras hovering over fish. Kimberly
Popken ’99 drew the poster.
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This
Geneseo Shale rock contains a fossil 385 million years old.
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Professor
of Geological Sciences Jeff Over holds a Geneseo Shale rock containing
a fossil from the Devonian that was unearthed in May during the
construction of the Integrated Science Facility. The specimen, Spyroceras,
was a squid-like creature with a conical shell, and is about 385
million years old.
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The
fossil will be displayed in Greene Hall’s first-floor display
case in front of this poster. Kimberly Popken ’99 drew this
poster that shows the ocean floor and a Spyroceras.
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Photos
by Ron Pretzer
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