Devil's Bridge is a place of much lore and history. The bridge crosses the River Lune, it's 3 arches harking back to Medieval times. The Devil has rumoured to have had dealings here, with the fabled story of the Old woman and her dealings with the Devil.
It is a busy place, though the bulk of folk stay up by the bridge. This EarthCache takes us to the limestone rocks which are downstream from the bridge.
🚨If the river is running high, or in spate DO NOT ATTEMPT THE EARTHCACHE. 🚨
🤔 We are here to look at this rock.
🤔 The geology of the location.
The rock is limestone, which is a sedimenatry rock. It was originally deposited as sediment in a shallow tropical sea. The sediment was the shells of dead sea creatures, snd lime mud. This limestone is part of the Urswick Formation Limestone, which was deposited during the Asbian Substage. This geological period was part of the Visean Stage of the Carboniferous Period. It is between 337 and 330.9 million years old.
🤔 What are we here to do?
We are here to examine this rock, and then decide what there is here. You need to look all over it. We need to be a geological detective.
🕵♂️ Look.
What can you see, are there any structures or shapes? Are there lines, circles or branches? What colours can you see?
🕵♂️ Feel.
Is the rock smooth, or rough? Are there any raised areas, lines or bumps? It helps if the rock is wet, so bring some water just incase you need it.
🕵♂️ Decide.
We then need to gather the evidence, and decide what are findings are.
🤔 To decide, we need background evidence.
This helps to make the decision. In geology there is a lot of literature, books and knowledge. We shall use that to help us.
🔎 What do we know?
Urswick Formation Limestone is known to contain fossils. These are the preserved trace of ancient animals, plants and activity. There are lots of fossil types, so we shall try and narrow the evidence down. We know it was a marine environment, but things can get washed into a sea from the land. So lets look at three sources of evidence, from an animal, plant and activity.
🔎 Animal.
Common fossils in limestone are coral fossils. These lived in tropical seas. They can appear like noodles, and sometimes they branch, and can appear like round or oval dots. If you look at the fossils closely, they have white linear lines running down them.
Coral fossils, from the Yorkshire Dales.
🔎 Plant.
Plants and trees can be preserved as fossils. They can appear to have patterns such as diamonds on them, and can also appear like planks of wood in the stone. They can also appear to have branches.
(Twig fossils from near Low Bentham).
🔎 Trace of activity.
These are called ichnofossils, and can be a record of movement such as footprints and burrows. They have been preserved in the sediment.
Fossil burrows.
📝 This being an EarthCache, in order to log it, I ask that you complete the below tasks. Please send the answers to me, and do not include them in your log. You can send them to me by using the message facility or email, both of which can be found by looking at my profile.
🕵♂️
🕵♂️1. Please examine the rock, and describe what you can see in terms if colours, and structures. How does the rock feel?
🕵♂️2. Using the above information, what type of fossil is this?
🕵♂️3. Please have your photograph taken with the Devils Bridge in the background, you can also take a picture of your device.