Keenan's Blogiddy Blog

I was invited by my friend Matt to partake in some field work at the Joggins fossil site. He had put in a few weeks ago an application for a Heritage Permit to extract a fossilized tree from the cliffs, still 'in situ'. From the information he gave me, it might be a tree that could be bearing fossilized remains of tiny animals within it. The tree, most likely a lycopsid such as a lepidodendron, would also have some sort of indication that it had been altered by fire. Forest fire during the Carboniferous Period (Myers) Tree is probably a member of the lycopsid family, such as this 'Lepidodendron' I accepted his invitation and prepared for this little endeavour. Matt had warned me about the cold, so I was prepared to wear triple tuque if need be. I drove down to Joggins, Nova Scotia and arrived a little after sun up. Matt had told me that we'd be joined by colleagues of his and that they'd be setting up scaffoldings on site. On exiting the car I had the pleas...

Me and my buddy Matt went for a trip to Halifax, Nova Scotia this past Saturday (November 26th, 2011) to snoop around the city and try to collect rocks and minerals. Why snoop around a big city for minerals? Halifax lies on top of a granitic pluton, a mass of magma located under the surface which has slowly cooled. The batholith intrusion was exposed over a long period of time, over several million years. The granite that you see on most road cuts leading in and out of the city was part of that feature. With igneous rock comes the chance to find interesting crystals. The area is known for its quartz (smoky), feldspar (K-feldspar), tourmaline, pyrite (fool's gold), and gold among other things. When we arrived in Halifax, we had driven by some road cuts that had yielded several minerals. We parked the car close-by so that we could go take a look before going for a bite to eat. We took some of our gear and headed out to check the outcrops. The granite contained fine to bigg...