An acclaimed international collection of earth science articles and book reviews on palaeontology, geology, minerals and more
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the eleventh and last of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Yorgia is one of the most distinctive members of the Ediacaran biota – a broad, quilted, segmented organism that thrived on the shallow seafloors of the White Sea region … Read More
Britain is often described as geologically quiet. There are no active volcanoes, no subduction zones, and only modest earthquakes. Yet, for its size, few countries display such a concentration of geological variety. Mountain uplands, volcanic terrains, deeply folded rocks, and ancient metamorphic cores all occur within a relatively small area. The explanation for this diversity lies not in Britain’s present tectonic setting, but in a long and complex tectonic history that assembled the country piece by piece from fragments that originated far apart.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the tenth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Of all the organisms populating the Ediacaran oceans, Tribrachidium stands out as one of the most geometrically extraordinary. Living around 555 million years ago, it possessed a perfectly tri-radial body plan … Read More
Books devoted specifically to collecting Britain’s Cenozoic fossils are surprisingly rare. While collectors are well served by guides to the country’s Palaeozoic and Mesozoic fossils, the younger deposits that record the last 66 million years of Earth history have received far less attention. A Field Guide to Collecting British Cenozoic Fossils aims to address that gap by providing a practical introduction to the fossils and collecting sites associated with these deposits.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) The geology and palaeontology section at the Museo di Storia Naturale: geology and palaeontology in Verona is one of those museum experiences that perhaps quietly insists you pay attention if you notice it there among the other attractions of this lovely town. It doesn’t shout with flashy … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the ninth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Spriggina is one of the most iconic animals of the late Ediacaran Period, living around 550 million years ago, just before the Cambrian explosion transformed life on Earth. Known from beautifully … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the eighth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Rangea is one of the most distinctive and important members of the Ediacaran biota. Dating to roughly 550 million years ago, it is amongst the earliest organisms to exhibit complex, modular … Read More
Luke Sattler (USA) I recently took a field trip to the Hartsel and South Park area of Colorado with my brother, grandparents, Steven Veatch (the Pikes Peak Pebble Pups Leader) and his wife, Shelly. We went to look at two pieces of real property owned by Steven Veatchin South Park, … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the seventh of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Kimberella is one of the most influential fossils from the Ediacaran period, living around 555 million years ago and preserved primarily in the White Sea region of northwest Russia. Unlike the … Read More
For much of the twentieth century, generations of students (and amateurs like me) learned a tidy, mid-Cretaceous succession for southern England:
Lower Greensand – Gault Clay – Upper Greensand – Chalk.
It appeared in every textbook, diagram and museum panel. There was an appealing symmetry to the sequence, with two sands bracketing the impervious Gault and the Chalk resting neatly above. It seemed so natural that few doubted it.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the sixth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Funisia dorothea is one of the most revealing fossils from the late Ediacaran Period, offering a rare glimpse into the behaviour of early animals rather than only their anatomy. Found in … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the sixth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period Fractofusus is one of the most abundant and ecologically revealing organisms of the Ediacaran Period, flourishing around 565 million years ago in the deep-marine settings of the Mistaken Point Formation, Newfoundland. … Read More
Robert J Williams (UK) To the north-east of London lies the county of Essex, which extends out to the east coast of England. Although not noted for its geology, it does have quite a bit to offer the amateur geologist. In addition, there is a significant body of published geological … Read More
This is the last of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE). The first covered the climate engine of the CPE and the second described the marine ecosystem upheaval during those times. This final article turns to the continents, examining how the CPE transformed terrestrial landscapes and ecosystems.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the fourth of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. And among the most intriguing organisms of the late Ediacaran Period is Ernietta, a sack-shaped, partly infaunal creature that lived around 548-541 million years ago in the shallow seas of what … Read More
Stephen K Donovan (UK) If asked what is my favourite fossil collecting site, I would have to say the Farquhar’s Beach oyster bed on the south-central coast of Jamaica. I taught at the University of the West Indies for over 12 years and this locality was an easy drive. In … Read More
This is the second of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE). The first covered the climate engine of the CPE. This article turns to the marine record, tracing how the CPE destabilised reefs and reorganised shallow-marine ecosystems.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the third of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Dickinsonia is one of the most recognisable and debated organisms of the Ediacaran Period, living between 558 and 550 million years ago on shallow seafloors long before the rise of animals … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) The Naturmuseum Südtirol is housed in an historic building in the old town of Bolzano and was opened in 1997 in its current form. Its major theme consists of the geology of South Tyrol, that is, the region’s rocks, minerals (Fig. 1) landscapes, tectonics, its natural habitats … Read More
This is the first of three articles on the Carnian Pluvial Event (CPE), often referred to as an ‘event’, although increasingly recognised as a prolonged episode, as I will discuss) of the Triassic that seems to have grown in importance and interest, and only become more widely known in relatively recent times. In this article, I will introduce the topic, concentrating on what might be called the “climate engine” driving what was happening.
I found the pebble almost by accident, while staying with friends near Eccleshall in Staffordshire. We had taken their two dogs (the much missed Holly and Chutney) out for an afternoon walk – the kind of slow, stop-start loop where the dogs dictate the pace and the conversation meanders as much as the footpath. Along a muddy stretch of track, something smooth and rounded caught my eye: a faintly banded, reddish stone lying half-buried among the usual Midlands gravel and mud.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the second of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Charniodiscus is one of the most characteristic frondose organisms of the Ediacaran Period, living around 560-555 million years ago in the quiet, low-energy seafloors that preceded the Cambrian explosion. With its … Read More
The Classic Geology in Europe series has, over many years, established a distinctive and reliable identity: authoritative regional syntheses written by specialists, designed for geologists who want to understand landscapes through field observation rather than armchair generalities. The Southern Pennines sits comfortably within that tradition and, in several respects, exemplifies the mature strengths of the series.
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the first of my series of short articles on fossils of the Ediacaran Period. Charnia is one of the most iconic fossils of the Ediacaran Period, known for its elegant frond-like form and its place among the earliest large, complex organisms in Earth’s history. First … Read More
Kurt Lahmers (USA) A closer look at a dinosaur bone found in the Garden Park area of Cañon City, Colorado (USA) shows some interesting details on the end of the bone. The holes in the dinosaur bone shownin Fig. 1 used to be tube-like structures called Haversian canals. These are … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the third and last of my series of short articles on fossils of the Pre-Cambrian. The stromatolites of the Tumbiana Formation, Western Australia, form one of the most remarkable biological records of the Late Archean, dating to around 2.72 billion years ago. These exquisitely preserved … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the second of my series of short articles on fossils of the Pre-Cambrian. The Strelley Pool stromatolites, preserved in the ~3.45-billion-year-old Strelley Pool Formation of Western Australia, rank among the oldest widely accepted macroscopic evidence of life. Formed on shallow marine carbonate platforms during the … Read More
Paul Lyle begins GeoHibernica with a slightly mischievous acknowledgement: the book exists only because the author of GeoBritannica was unable to take on its Irish counterpart himself. It is a revealing admission, and one that immediately invites comparison between the two works. That comparison is instructive, although not always in the ways one might expect.
Vassilis Makridis (Greece), Evangelia Tsoukala (Greece), Evangelos Vlachos (Greece), Katerina Tsekoura (Greece), Wilrie van Logchem (The Netherlands) and Dick Mol (The Netherlands) In northern Greece, 45km north of Thessaloniki, one of the few public caves in Northern Greece is situated in the Agios Georgios Hill, near Kilkis (Figs. 1 and … Read More
Jon Trevelyan (UK) This is the first of my series of short articles on fossils of the Pre-Cambrian. The Gunflint stromatolites, preserved in the 1.88-billion-year-old Gunflint Iron Formation of Ontario and Minnesota, offer one of the clearest windows into early complex microbial ecosystems. Formed by thriving mats of cyanobacteria long … Read More
