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   TID: hpt/lnx 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
    EPOD - a service of USRA   
      
   The Earth Science Picture of the Day (EPOD) highlights the diverse processes   
   and phenomena which shape our planet and our lives. EPOD will collect and   
   archive photos, imagery, graphics, and artwork with short explanatory   
   captions and links exemplifying features within the Earth system. The   
   community is invited to contribute digital imagery, short captions and   
   relevant links.   
      
      
    Ancient Fossil Assemblage Discovered in Utah   
      
      August 09, 2022   
      
       JoeB_3 (7)   
      
    JoeB_1 (18)   
      
   Photographer:  Joe Bauman   
      
   Summary Author:  Joe Bauman   
      
      While hunting  trilobites in 1994, my son, Sky, and I came upon a   
       Cambrian site in Utah that at first seemed unpromising. But decades   
      later, when I resumed studying rocks picked up there, it became obvious   
      that this is one of the world’s most remarkable  Lagerstätten   
      (extraordinary fossil assemblages) formations, with exceptional   
      preservation, including soft tissue of ancient lifeforms. Because of   
      the presence of the sponge-like  archaeocyathids, I’m able to date   
      it to sometime during the  Early Cambrian Period, about 540 million   
      or 530 million years ago. All of the fossils I found at this site are   
      small, the largest just a few centimeters long; most are far tinier, in   
      the range of millimeters or less.   
      
      Among the remains are leaflike forms, possible holdovers from the   
       Ediacaran Period of the Precambrian; echinoderms, particularly   
      carpoids and Gogia, and  arthropods. The most astonishing of the   
      last are fossils preserved within globules of crystal (probably   
      calcite) or sheathed within it (bottom photo). Remains thus preserved   
      often show soft material such as legs and internal structures. Note   
      that insects preserved in amber are at least 200 million years younger.   
      
      To protect the site from collectors, it’s important to keep the   
      location secret from the public. But I’m hopeful that academic   
      paleontologists will want to know the location and to borrow specimens,   
      with which I’ll gladly comply. Eventually, many of the specimens I   
      found will be donated to the  Utah Museum of Natural History in Salt   
      Lake City. Scientists interested in learning more may contact me   
      at  josephmbauman@yahoo.com.   
      
      For a fuller description, see my blog at  The Early Cambrian: A New   
      Utah Lagerstätte (the-nightly-news.com)   
      
      
      
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