Fossil Fossicking (Earthcache) EarthCache
Fossil Fossicking (Earthcache)
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You do not need to go to the exact coordinates. Focus on the cliff face and beach rather than your GPS screen. Fossils can be found over quite some distance.
2hr return conservative, you need to get tides right.
Rock hopping required, will likely get your feet wet, minimum 25-20 minutes one way.
You do not need to go to the exact coordinates. Focus on the cliff face and beach rather than your GPS screen. Fossils can be found over quite some distance.
2hr return conservative, you need to get tides right.
Rock hopping required, will likely get your feet wet, minimum 25-20 minutes one way.
Large parts of New Zealand were formed by uplifted seabed, making it rich in marine fossils. For this reason there are fossils from marine organisms found from high in the mountains right down to the coast.
You can’t find fossils everywhere in New Zealand though as it takes special conditions to make a fossil. Fossils form when the bones, shells or other parts of dead animals are protected from erosion and decay for a long time. That means that they have been protected from the effects of wind, flowing water and oxidation by layers of mud, or sand or silt or even other organisms long enough for these deposits to form into rocks. The fossils are either preserved as parts of the organism or as imprints that the organism left behind (trace fossils).
Fossils can be as small as a single cell or as large as a dinosaur or a tree. A fossil that was once a part of an organism is called a body fossil e.g. a bone or tooth. A fossil that was made by the organism doing something when it was alive, e.g. footprints, is called a trace fossil and a fossil that is made by chemical reactions as the dead organism decomposes is called a biomarker. The fossils that you will find at this cache are body fossils of sea creatures that once lived around New Zealand. Some of them still have relatives living around New Zealand today so they should be fairly easy for you to see and recognise against the rocks.
Access
Access to this cache is determined by the tides and requires walking along rocky shoreline against a cliff face. You will want to have returned from the cache no later than 2 hours after low tide. Cliff scrambles are not recommended and there is no access route from further south.
From Motunau Beach, park on near the intersection of the Parade and Beach Road. On foot, follow the beach around the cliff face until you reach the listed coordinates.
Check the tides (Lyttelton +19 minutes) and weather forecasts (www.weather.co.nz)
for both Kaikoura and coastal situation before undertaking this cache.
For best fossil viewing visit in the days following a southerly storm when more fossils are exposed. You may even find some loose ones amongst the rocks along the shore as you walk around.
Cache Logging Requirements
For requirements 1-3, please send me a message via my cacher profile. For 4, please include this in you online log.
1. Name the type of rock that the fossils are in, in what geological period the rock was formed, and how old it is.
On your walk around the cliff face you will have noticed that there is an island not very far off shore. Find out what H. maculatus and Eudyptula minor albosignata, two of the natives of the island are.
2. Would you be likely to see fossils from either of these species in the cliff face? Explain why or why not.
3. Name one other place in Canterbury where you can find fossils (museums, schools and private collections don’t count).
Different types of fossils can be found in the cliff face and surrounding shoreline. The types that are known in this area include penguin bones, frilled crab, crayfish, algal nodules, whalebone, coral and shark teeth.
EITHER
4a. (preferable) Take a photo of your gps (ideally showing the coordinates) and the fossil in the cliff face. Upload the photo with your log, and write what you think the fossil is from. (You may find The Reed Field Guide to New Zealand Geology useful in identifying your fossil. It can be sourced from many public libraries.)
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4b. Identify a fossil listing size (ideally length in mm), what part of organism it was from, the function of the part and the coordinates where you found it.
Additional Hints
(No hints available.)
Treasures
You'll collect a digital Treasure from one of these collections when you find and log this geocache:
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